Red Ninja
by Desert.Moon
Summary: Let's see, I'm not so great at summaries...Meet Sabuka Keiteri, a cynical kunoichi who shows up in Konoha without a headband. When Gaara attacks, she's intrigued, and follows him back to Sand, at the same time unwittingly embarking on a quest for her past
1. Chapter 1

IMPORTANT NOTE: My friend, to both my gratitude and annoyance with myself, has mentioned the fact that people in the desert would probably wear more clothes to cover up, as protection from the sun, rather than shorts and sleeveless shirts. I am an idiot and completely didn't think about this, and deserve to be shot. If I get extremely un-lazy, I may go back and fix this; more likely than not, if it gets done at all, it won't be 'til I've finished the rest of Red Ninja.

Despite the fact that is incorrect, Sabuka will probably continue to wear shorts and at least short sleeve shirts, because it is the only way I can think of to introduce/continue to mention her problems wearing 'revealing' clothes, and her reasons, which are extremely important, as you will soon read. I know that, having lived in the desert, Ora would know better and give her suitable clothing, but I'd rather advance the story then be completely correct (I'd rather do both, of course, perfectionist that I am, but just now, I just can't think of another way to work it in...). So Sabuka is going to keep wearing unsuitable clothes.

OTHER IMPORTANT NOTES: The fact that Sasuke was mildly out-of-character was mentioned a few times. I guess I didn't really convey the fact that his "smiles" were supposed to be those sort of... I dunno, the not-happy-and-even-sort-of-mildly-creepy-not-really-a-smile-but-nothing-else-to-call-it expression. I saw it once when Sasuke was taunting Naruto (again). But yeah... although he didn't actually come out and say he liked her, just that she interested him. As in, he wanted to see her fighting style - and maybe know if she was one of those people he had to get stronger to beat so he could beat Itachi. I should have made that clearer, I guess. Luckily, Sasuke's not really that big a part in the story, so it doesn't make much difference when it happens.

So, some people might be wondering when this story takes place. I know I'm wondering. And the answer is...  
Not a clue!  
It is sometime after the Chunin Exams, because that is when Sasuke used Chidori against Gaara. However, right after the Chunin Exams, Gaara fights Naruto, learns about love, becomes a little nicer.  
So the time period is... a nonexistent time period! Hooray! 

Gaara, Sasuke, Naruto, Sakura, Kakashi; Leaf, Sand, and Rain Villages; all jutsus of the above mentioned people; etc. (C) Masashi Kishimoto-dono.  
Sabuka Keiteri; her jutsus; story (C) Kit (a.k.a. watashi/moi/me, depending on the language you want to use)

Red Ninja

"He looks..."

"Stuck."

"Ridiculous." 

"Like a bundle of bright orange herbs hung out to dry, maybe?"

"No, not stiff enough."

"Well, _I_ think he looks like a fish," cut in a girl with cardinal red hair and light, seafoam green eyes, "flopping around up there." There was a murmur of appreciative laughter.

"Ha ha, very funny," broke in the loud, obnoxious voice of Naruto Uzumaki, who was hanging, rather ridiculously, upside-down from a tree.

"Naruto, if it didn't work the first time, what made you think it would work _this_ time?" inquired a voice with that tone of weary exasperation belonging to someone who would normally be annoyed, but was so used to the occurrence that they had become merely... well, wearily exasperated. The red-haired girl turned around to see that it was Naruto's Sensei, Kakashi.

"You are _such_ a loser," added a thoroughly disgusted boy with blue-black hair, while a rose-haired girl shouted angrily, "Naruto! You idiot!" 

Naruto flailed around uselessly for a few more moments, then looked around pitifully for help. The red-haired girl slipped away from the crowd of laughter and the knucklehead ninja.

It wasn't long before someone caught up with her.

"Hey. Wait."

She turned; it was the ninja with blue-black hair. Sasuke Uchiha, she knew - but then, most people did.

"You're new to Leaf Village, aren't you?" he asked.

"No, I've lived here all my life," she replied in a perfectly bland tone of voice.

He looked momentarily disarmed, then - surprisingly, from what she'd heard about him - his mask broke and he grinned. "I was just about to say that you have a wicked sense of humor. When did you really get here?"

"This morning."

Sasuke seemed mildly surprised. "That recently? Your reputation has spread like wildfire. But I haven't caught a name."

"Sabuka Keiteri," the red-haired girl supplied.

He nodded in greeting. "Sasuke Uchiha."

"So I've heard."

The shinobi's face composed again. "Of course." He paused. "What village did you come from? You wear no headband that I can see."

"Village Hidden in the Rain."

"Really? Or is that another joke?"

"I suppose you'll have to figure that out yourself if you don't believe me. Why?"

Sasuke hesitated. "You really do look like him."

"Him?" Sabuka repeated blankly. "Him who?"

"Gaara of the Desert. Same red hair hair, same pale green eyes. Haven't you ever heard of him?"

"No."

"Are you sure? You're not related or anything?"

"I've never even been to Sand Village," Sabuka said.

"Did I say he was from Sand Village?"

"You're grasping at straws, trying to pin me down. You said he was from the desert. That's where Sand Village is."

Sasuke nodded stonily. Sabuka turned away.

"Wait," the shinobi commanded. Loathe to obey anyone, Sabuka halted, but didn't turn back around. 

"You interest me, and not just because you insulted Naruto. If you ever want practice, come to me. I'm interested in seeing your fighting style."

"Naruto-bashing makes the world go 'round," Sabuka replied blandly, but she didn't disagree. And as she walked away, she turned her head and gave the tiniest of nods.

She didn't ask why he assumed she was shinobi when she sported no headband.

--

The rooftops were her favorite, no matter what village she was in. Rain Village's were excellent for sitting and thinking beneath the rain, of course, but she had to say that Sand's were the best. You could see for miles from those roofs; miles and miles of desert drifting the the wind.

She had, of course, been there. She had been most anywhere, so many places that she was no longer sure of her starting point. But something in Uchiha's eyes had prevented her from saying so.

Sabuka lay back and stared up at the brilliant blue sky. A healthy emerald leaf drifted across her vision, dancing along on the breeze. She was certain she would climb one of the trees, later; they were immense elders of great stature here, and she was looking forward to the view.

One wouldn't know by looking at her that she was the kind of girl who lay around admiring the view. She was dressed in loose, comfortable grey trousers, with the shuriken holster in an easily accessible place on her right thigh, and a black, three-quarter-sleeved t-shirt. Her seafoam eyes were almost perpetually narrowed in an expression of dry irritation at the world in general, although they had been known to soften from time to time. She did wear her red hair down, but only because it was more comfortable for her. Most of the time, she went barefoot, except for in winter, of course, when she wore black socks and sandals. She was a hardy girl, and used to most weather, hot or cold. A tomboy to the bone, but with a prominent fondness for just stopping to look at nature.

_Gaara of the Desert... Haven't you ever heard of him?_

Sabuka had caught a glimpse of him once, but she hadn't noticed any particular resemblance to herself. Then again, it had been only a glimpse, and she hadn't exactly looked in a mirror just afterwards. Nor had she had the chance to meet his eyes.

Who knew? Maybe they _were_ related. Sabuka doubted it, but anything was possible, and it wasn't like she really knew where she came from.

"You know, you weren't very nice to me earlier," said a voice loudly and petulantly, breaking in Sabuka's silent reflections.

"I'm terribly sorry." Apparently, the sarcasm was lost in Naruto. 

"Apology accepted," he announced. Sabuka rolled her eyes, but Naruto didn't notice. "Who are you?"

"That's a terribly personal question."

"Huh?"

"You must be such an expert on rocks." Sabuka's voice dripped with sarcasm, but again, Naruto missed it.

"Why would ya say somethin' like that?"

"Anyone with a head so full of stones must know so much about them."

Someone snickered. Sabuka sat up and twisted around. "My silent sanctuary has become a madhouse," she remarked. The snickerer was Sasuke Uchiha. "What do you want?"

"Naruto came to annoy you. I came to find him. Kakashi-sensei wants us. Now." 

"Aw," whined Naruto. "I was going to go out for ramen."

"Then why were you bothering me?" asked Sabuka irritably.

Sasuke looked at her calculatingly. "You coming with?"

Sabuka started. "Sure," she decided.

"What for?" demanded Naruto.

"Why not?" countered Sasuke.

"Are we going or not?" asked Sabuka boredly, but a smile touched her face.

"Yes," snapped Sasuke, just as Naruto shouted annoyingly, "Yeah, believe it!"

Sabuka kept her comment about that one to herself.

When the two continued to stare each other down and failed to move, Sabuka rolled her eyes. "Do I have to remind you that, while you have lived here all or almost all of your lives, I got here this morning, and thus haven't the foggiest idea of where to go?"

"No, we're going," said Sasuke shortly, but still didn't move. Then, without warning, his eyes still locked on Naruto's in a venomous glare, the dark-haired shinobi twisted his body and delivered a perfectly-controlled side kick to Naruto's chest. Caught off-guard, Naruto flew backwards, thus being the first to break eye contact, but was otherwise unharmed.

The orange-clad shinobi leapt to his feet. "You won't get away with that, Sasuke, believe it!" he shouted, pointing, but Sasuke had already turned away.

This time, Sabuka couldn't resist. "What do you want me to believe? That you're a loser or that you're a liar?"

Sasuke hid a smile. "How are you going to stop me, _loser_?" he asked without looking back and Naruto. Instead, he kept walking, and Sabuka hoped that they were finally leaving, but suspected that this had quite a ways to go yet.

She was right. With a wordless yell, Naruto leapt for Sasuke. Smooth as a dance, Sasuke turned and effortlessly blocked the wild attack, then once more twisted and delivered a second perfect side kick. Naruto hit the stone with a sickening crack, but - demonstrating the hardness of the knucklehead ninja - only the roof had broken, and the orange-clad shinobi returned immediately to his feet, obviously undeterred. 

"This is where it really gets started!" Naruto yelled. His hands came together and he concentrated, then cried, "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" About twenty Narutos appeared.

"Ah, my favorite," said Sabuka dryly. "Naruto's only fan club, consisting of a multitude of unnecessary orange-clad shinobi." 

Deftly, Sasuke swept several kunai from their pouch tot he clones. Every one of them hit its mark, and about a fourth of the Narutos vanished in a cloud of smoke. The remaining copies all flew toward the dark-haired shinobi, but he repeated the movement with both kunai and shuriken until only the original remained.

"This is ridiculous," said Sasuke disgustedly. "Stop wasting your chakra. Kakashi-sensei wanted us there ten minutes ago." 

"_Sasuke_!" shouted Naruto furiously, aiming several kunai at his tormentor. Sasuke took off running, leaping to the next roof without a backward glance for Sabuka. She recognized it as the only way to get Naruto to get going and stop fighting; she followed the contentious shinobi without a word.

--

The blood had to be half an inch think, but it was draining away, seeping into the stone, staining the street a brilliant crimson. Sabuka regarded the bodies with a tranquil gaze, but horror suffused through her.

Sasuke knelt at the edge of the crimson expanse, his face composed into a mask once more. Even Naruto had quieted, his and Sasuke's animosity temporarily forgotten.

"I don't know why he's here," said Sasuke grimly, touching the blood; his fingers came away scarlet and gritty, "but this is _definitely_ his work."

"I presume you're speaking of the same 'he' as before," said Sabuka quietly. "You never said anything about him being a murderer."

"If you get the chance," replied Sasuke, "look into his eyes. They're pure evil."

"I thought you told me," Sabuka responded softly, "that my eyes were the same as his." 

Sasuke shook his head. "They're the exact same color," he clarified, "but that's where the resemblance ends." 

"Who are you talking about?" Naruto whined. 

"Gaara of the Desert."

At that point, Kakashi hurried over, looking weary and angry. Sakura, the rose-haired girl from before, trailed him.

"Sasuke! Naruto! What took so long?" demanded Kakashi. "Did it occur to you that when I say I need you, it just might be important?" 

"Naruto was being an idiot again," said Sasuke icily. The orange-clad shinobi opened his mouth to defend himself, but Kakashi caught sight of Sabuka just then.

"Good, you brought a friend," he said. "We'll need all the help we can get."

"Why is he here?" Sasuke asked quietly. 

"How should I know?" snapped Kakashi. "Do you think I can read minds? You of all people know the Sharingan doesn't do that!"

"Hey!" shouted Sakura, speaking for the first time. "Don't blame Sasuke! He - "

"Something tells me we don't have time for this," interrupted Sabuka, watching a wisp of sand drift across the sea of blood. She didn't really know anything about it, but she did know that sand did not often move on its own.

"No, we don't," Sasuke agreed coldly. Sakura trailed off.

Sand twisted around itself in a deadly dance above the blood, and a boy appeared in the center of the storm. His hair _was_ the same cardinal red as Sabuka's, and his eyes _were_ the same pale, seafoam green, but when she looked into them, she didn't see any of the evil Sasuke had mentioned.

All she saw was pain.

--


	2. Chapter 2

"Sabuka!" shouted Sasuke. Mesmerized by Gaara's eyes, she stood frozen as sand crept toward her, more and more of it. Startled awake, Sabuka dodged out of the way and leapt toward Gaara, her hands suddenly bristling with shuriken. She flung them at Gaara, then aimed a flying side kick at his chest. However, she met only a wall of sand, not flesh, and she fell into the sea of crimson with a sickening splash. Disgusted, Sabuka scrambled to her feet and jumped backwards out of it.

"I could have told you that would happen," Sasuke muttered.

"Nice of you to mention that you could have told me _before_ I actually tried it," Sabuka replied out of the side of her mouth.

"Sometimes a strong enough jutsu will get through it," Sasuke advised.

"I don't have any particularly strong jutsus," Sabuka admitted, but her gaze dropped to her left arm, just below her elbow, breaking eye contact with Sasuke. 

"The Sand and Leaf Villages are allies!" Sakura was shouting, distracting Sasuke. "Why are you killing our people?" 

"Your rules and theirs do not apply to me," Gaara snarled. "I have no allies. I will kill every living being but for myself. My existence will remain!"

"What is his deal?" muttered Sabuka, the fear not showing in her words... but it was there.

"Now is not the time to explain," Sasuke said grimly, undoing the wrappings around his arm. "Cover me, please."

"I take if you have one of the afore-mentioned 'strong enough jutsus'?"

"Yes, it's worked against him in the past."

"Do you expect me to take a fatal wound for you?" Sabuka inquired.

"I _expect_ you to be able to block it," he retorted.

"You have a lot of confidence in my abilities for never having seen me fight." 

"I saw you attack. That was a perfect side kick, and would have worked if not for the sand." He began making hand seals and backing away as he did so.

"One side kick is not an adequate evaluation of ability," Sabuka began, but Sasuke cut her off.

"Don't argue! Just go!" he said, continuing to move his hands in complicated patterns.

Kakashi saw what he was doing and apparently had a problem with it. "Sasuke - "

"Not a chance, Sensei," said the dark-haired shinobi grimly. "This one's mine."

--

Sabuka glanced over at Gaara, wondering why no attacks were forthcoming. She was shocked to see him bent over slightly, hands pressed to his head, pain warping his features.

_And they call him evil. Am I the only one who sees this?_ But she caught sight of the bodies of the Leaf villagers. _There has to be a reason..._ Eventually, his hands dropped, and Sabuka knew with a deadly certainty that the attacks were about to start.

Gathering a bit of chakra, Sabuka teleported over to where Naruto was standing uselessly. "Uzumaki! Can you do the clone thing again?" 

"Believe it!"

She rolled her eyes. "For now, I will." Sand was gathering like a living thing, creeping toward Sasuke, who was gathering chakra in his arm. "As many as you can. The goal is not to attack Gaara but to stop him from attacking Sasuke." The clones seemed perfect for getting in the way of those lethal-looking sand spikes.

"I can do the same," said Kakashi, multiplying into many more clones than Naruto. "It's a decent plan, since Sasuke has taken the Chidori upon himself."

Sabuka turned to Sakura. "I don't know what you can do."

"I can do that, too, but mine aren't solid," Sakura confessed tremulously. "And I'm a medical ninja. But," she added in a firmer voice, "_I_ would take a fatal wound for Sasuke."

"I'm sure you would," Sabuka murmured. She had enough tact to understand that this was not the time for a cutting remark, but privately, she thought it would be better to let Sasuke take the wound if Sakura could heal it. "Alright, go stand in front of Sasuke. You're the last line of defense. But it tells you to move, _move_, because he's probably got a good reason."

Looking marginally happier, Sakura teleported over to Sasuke. Kakashi and Naruto clones were throwing themselves into deterring sand attacks while Sasuke gathered his chakra from a distance. Sabuka felt momentarily lost.

_What do I do now?_

_--_

Sabuka crept around behind the sand ninja, unnoticed. She _didn't_ have any super-strong techniques, and she _wasn't_ selfless enough to take a fatal wound for anyone, but that didn't mean she couldn't aid in the distraction.

She stood directly behind Gaara now. Pressing her first and middle fingers against their partners on the other hand, she folded and crossed the remaining digits. Chakra gathered in her hands as she whispered, "_Akarai Jutsu_ - Red Lightning Technique!"

From her palm, which was now turned outward, the back of her hand pressed against her other palm, a bolt of crimson electricity, the same hue as the blood it sped across, zigzagged toward Gaara. As Sabuka had expected, it met only a wall of golden sand, but Gaara felt the impact and whirled around, furious. A multitude of clones took the opportunity to fling themselves at Gaara's now exposed back. Sand twined around itself, pouring out of the gourd Gaara carried, shielding, and destroying the copies one by one. Apparently, Gaara didn't consider them enough of a threat and let the sand deal with the clones behind his back.

Over and under it danced, waves of gold slipping towards her, dusty, deadly fury. Gaara's hand was stretched out, as if reaching for her, but Sabuka wasn't fool enough to mistake it for longing. His lips moved, and she could just barely make out the words.

"Desert Coffin," he said, and it was a malicious, sibilant hiss. 

Licking her lips and finding her voice through her panic, Sabuka flung her arms up into an X-block and gasped, "_Akakekkai_ - Red Barrier!"

A transparent crimson shield sprung into existence, a perfect sphere half above ground and half below. The wave broke against it, rebounding in a spray of gold dust, glittering in the dappled light beneath the trees. It spiraled around and returned, beating relentlessly against the barrier, twisting and writhing like a swarm of tiny insects.

Chakra poured into the shield as Sabuka searched for salvation. She saw Sasuke say something; she saw a worried-looking Sakura step out of the way. Shimmering blue danced around the hand that hung at the dark shinobi's side and he began to run.

--

Sabuka eyed the glimmering Chidori and knew that it would penetrate Gaara's defenses, especially since Sasuke had said that it had worked in the past. This was good, because she couldn't maintain the barrier for too much longer. But...

She was crazy for it, she knew, but she hoped it didn't kill him.

Sasuke raced toward Gaara; Sabuka created another tentative bolt of red lightning to draw his attention closer to her, away from Sasuke.

But he turned anyway. It was almost too late at that point; Sasuke was nearly upon him. There was not enough time for Gaara to do anything, though sand began to gather in a desperate, futile attempt to halt impending doom.

In the last half a second, Sabuka transferred the barrier.

The Chidori could get through the sand. It could get through the barrier. But it couldn't get through both.

Sasuke, puzzled, struggled to push through as he crashed into the combined shield. The Red Barrier shattered, but he had lost momentum and couldn't fully penetrate the sand shield.

In a whirlwind of gold, Gaara vanished, leaving them with several bodies and a whole lot of blood.

--

"What the hell was that for?" Sasuke demanded, striding up to her. Sabuka regarded him coolly and responded with, "I'm going to Sand Village."

"You are _not_," he said furiously.

"I wasn't aware that you had any power over me. I'm going back to the desert."

"You said you'd never been," Sasuke accused.

Sabuka smiled wryly. "You're grasping again. I said I'd never been to Sand Village, not that I'd never been to the desert. Besides..." She paused. "I lied."

"What else did you lie about?" he asked irritably. "Where you're from? Are you related to him, then?"

Sabuka hesitated, then shook her head. "No. No, I really don't think so. I'm not from Sand Village." Her face hardened. "But I _am_ going."

"I would like an answer to Sasuke's question," Kakashi said mildly, coming up. "Why did you stop the Chidori?"

Sabuka shrugged. "It seemed like the thing to do at the time."

Leaving it at that, she walked away.

--

Sabuka slipped through the gates of Leaf Village soon after. She knew that Squad Seven was busy helping clean up the mess, so they - especially Sasuke and his unhealthy obsession with Gaara - would be unable to follow and interrogate her further, at least for now.

Nevertheless, Sabuka bypassed stopping to purchase any food, worried about the time it would take. She still had some travel rations left anyway, and it wasn't as if she were walking the entire distance. She _was_ a shinobi, and there were plenty of ways to make the journey go faster.

She wasn't sure she knew the desert well enough to teleport all the way there, so she gathered chakra in her feet and began to run.

--

It had been early afternoon when she left, and now it was late, _late_ evening. Night was gathering, day quickly extinguished in a spray of fiery glory as the sun drowned in an ocean of sand.

Sand. She had run and run, pouring chakra into her feet, faster and faster, more and more. She had stopped only a few times, because she wanted to reach the desert before nightfall, even though it was so far away. Her chakra was drained; there would be nothing to protect her through the night. She would just have to hope.

Her bare toes swam in the pleasant, grainy sea, and Sabuka took a few more stumbling steps. Then, weary to the bone, she gave up. Sinking to the ground, she fell asleep in the last, dying rays of the sun.

--

Sweat crawled across her face, stinging her eyes, and that was what woke her. Or maybe it was the shadow that passed over her... No, there was no shadow; that was only wishful thinking. She may have adapted to extreme temperatures - and she could bear them easily without complaining - but that didn't mean she had to _like_ them. Especially not with an almost-long-sleeve, _black_ shirt and long pants.

In fact, Sabuka wasn't sure how she had slept so far into the day beneath this oppressive heat. But then she remembered: Running. Running and running and running and running out of chakra and then running out of the will to stay awake. 

Tentatively, Sabuka tested for chakra. A little had returned with sleep.

So... here she was.

Sasuke never had told her Gaara's story, but then, that had been more her fault than his, what with her running off and all. But maybe, just maybe, it was better that way. She was afraid of that story, even as she wanted so much to hear it. She was afraid she would find no reasons for what he had done.

--

Not long after she began to walk, Sabuka rolled up her right sleeve. Unfortunately, it kept sliding down, and eventually, she tore it off. The ebony cloth fluttered forlornly away in the hot wind, a retreating raven, leaving Sabuka looking a little lopsided. But her left sleeve stayed untouched, and so, too, did her trousers.

Sand waltzed around her ankles, and though it was searing beneath her bare feet, she hardly noticed. There were enough calluses from walking around without shoes that she hardly noticed anyway.

She was weary to the bone, and the view was still the same monotonous sand, although it had a sort of golden beauty that kept her eyes riveted on the horizon. _This is the truth of the world,_ she realized suddenly. _We walk and walk, and all around us, the world stays the same. But there's something so inexplicably beautiful about it that keeps our eyes on the future and our dreams in our eyes._

At long last, the buildings of the Village Hidden In Sand rose from the expanse and Sabuka wondered if she'd reached the future.

--

She passed into the village without incident, and abrupt segue between monotony and variation. It left her momentarily disoriented, but the feeling faded quickly, leaving her with the impression of emptiness one gets when losing something precious to the heart.

Her first impulse was to find Gaara, or to at least find someone who could tell her about him. However, reason won out: She need rest. An inn: An inn would be helpful.

Sabuka's strides became a meandering, dizzy stumble. People shied away from her drunken walk, fear lighting in their eyes, but she was too tired to even notice, let alone puzzle out why. She hadn't the foggiest idea where she was going.

At least, someone took pity on the unstable stranger, stepping out of the crowd to catch her. Sabuka's last, semi-coherent thought before unconsciousness was, _Well, this sucks worse than Naruto's kicks._ Then Naruto led to Sasuke and Sasuke led to Gaara and she fell into dreams of sand.

--


	3. Chapter 3

She twitched, blinked, jerked away. The woman hovering over her had a face like a hatchet and chin-length, ragged oak hair. Her sharp black eyes were stern, but there was a kindness in their depths.

"Er, good morning," Sabuka tried.

"Afternoon," the woman corrected. "Do you remember what happened?"

"Yes," Sabuka replied promptly, sitting up. She was on a pallet on a wood floor, covered with a thin white sheet. "I came to Sand Village around sundown. I walk walking like a drunk person. Then I collapsed and dreamed of Gaar - dening, and then I woke up here." 

"That's a relief. Amnesia is ever so troublesome." 

"I also remember, Sabuka went on, "that people were pulling away from me. Now, I've only been here once before, but I _don't_ remember either drunks or travelers being so terrifying."

The woman sat back on her heels and was silent.

"Ah," said Sabuka understandingly. "Is it because I look similar to Gaara?"

"You know this?"

"I've been told." Sabuka paused. "What can you tell me about Gaara? I don't know much."

The woman shrugged. "He is a son of the Kazekage. There is a demon inside of him. He believes that the killing of everyone else is his reason for existence." 

"But _why_?" Sabuka pressed.

The woman shrugged again. "Because he is a _monster_," she spat.

_That _can't_ be it. There _has_ to be a reason. I _saw_ the pain._ But Sabuka bowed her head and left it at that.

After a brief silence, the woman shifted uncomfortably and stood. "I'm Ora Kaido," she began.

"Why aren't _you_ afraid of me?" Sabuka asked. "Why did you bring me home?" 

Ora shrugged once more, still uncomfortable. "Because I know you're not related. I was at the birth's of the Kazekage's children, a midwife. Three: Temari, Kankuro. and..." She paused, then spat out the last word. "...Gaara. The Kazekage's brother-in-law had no children. No other relatives of Gaara. Your resemblance is purely coincidental."

Sabuka was silent, then nodded. "I'm Sabuka Keiteri. I... want to stay here, in town, for a while. Do you know of a place I can stay? Work?" 

"You can stay with me," Ora offered, "if you'll work for me."

"Yes ma'am." Sabuka saluted her. "Ready for duty, whatever it is."

"You are not. Did you forget that you collapsed?"

It was Sabuka's turn to shrug. "I cam to Sand Village on foot. I was tired, that's all. Besides, it's only - what did you say I'd be doing?"

"I own a café, I suppose you could call it."

"I don't think waiting tables is the best job for me," Sabuka pointed out.

"Don't worry." A mischievous spark lit in Ora's black eyes. "You'll be washing dishes."

"My favorite," Sabuka said dryly as Ora headed for the room's only door. Ora nodded solemnly.

"Wait." Ora paused, looked back.

"Yes?"

"Is... Is Gaara in town?"

"Yes. He just got back." Ora's eyes hardened. "It'd be best if you avoided him." 

"I'll keep that in mind."

"Good. Stay here and sleep more now."

"Sleep? How much more do you want me to sleep? I've been sleeping for nearly twenty-four hours," Sabuka protested wryly.

"Fine. Don't sleep." Ora looked around, then picked up a thick book from the room's only dresser and chucked it and Sabuka, who caught it deftly, if cautiously. "Read."

Sabuka looked down. _A History of Shinobi._

"I learned this back at the Ninja Academy," she sighed, but Ora was already gone.

--

Several long and tedious hours later, Sabuka was about halfway through the book. There were, actually, some interesting tidbits tucked away in the pages. (For example, the fact that kunai had originally been garden tools. Sabuka wondered if the teachers had left that out in an attempt to preserve the "romantic" shinobi legends.) However, the majority of the information was stuff she'd learned once already.

Sabuka flipped a few pages in a dull, desultory sort of way, then sighed and leaned back, closing the book with a snap. Resting on the pillow, Sabuka stared at the ceiling. It was still sometime before sunset, but she was starting to feel tired again; apparently, running from Leaf to Sand Village took more than twenty-four hours of sleep to recover from.

Her eyes were just drifting closed when something scratchy and muffling landed on her face. Startled back awake, Sabuka sat up and caught the small pile of folded clothes that fell into her hands.

Ora's head was poking through the doorway. "Your clothes are ripped and - though it isn't particularly easy to avoid in the desert - sandy, not to mention far unsuitable for this weather. Wear those." 

Sabuka held the shirt up; it was pure ivory and sleeveless. No good. The shorts were knee-length, baggy, and dark blue-grey. No good either.

"I can't wear these."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm hideously disfigured beneath my clothing," Sabuka said dryly, "and need something less revealing."

"I don't consider those particularly revealing," Ora replied, obviously not believing her.

"I do."

"Wear them anyway." Ora's head vanished, but her voice floated back. "And hurry up."

After a few moments of indecision, Sabuka did change shirts, but tied a strip of ebony cloth around her arm, just below her elbow, rather like a tourniquet. As for pants, she kept her own.

Now ready, Sabuka figured it was probably best to wait for Ora to return and fetch her. However, what was best and what she wanted to do were not the same just now. Sabuka was bored, and a jaunt through unknown territory seemed like a fine way to end the bed's captivity of her.

Striding out the doorway, Sabuka immediately turned left without pausing to consider. The hallway stretched on; obviously, the house was larger than it appeared from one room.

_Excellent._

Sabuka wandered carelessly through a multitude of corridors, poking her head into each doorway. A few people were sleeping on pallets similar to the one she was borrowing, assuring Sabuka that Ora wasn't the only one living here. The hallways were dark, with no candles adding to the desert's heat, which lingered despite the falling sun, although it was fading.

Sabuka found Ora at last, talking to a man in a kitchen. Ora looked up, glanced at Sabuka's clothing, frowned, said one more thing, then strode over to Sabuka.

"I was about to come get you."

Sabuka smiled innocently. "The book wasn't enough of a challenge. I needed the maze."

Ora led the way through more hallways, Sabuka trailing in her wake. The woman dropped back and nodded to the black cloth.

"Are you in mourning?"

"Yes," Sabuka lied; it was far easier than explaining. Ora waited, but Sabuka volunteered no more information. Instead, the kunoichi asked, in what was probably the politest tone she'd ever used, for some water.

"I don't know whether you gave me any while I was unconscious...?" Ora nodded as if this were obvious, which it was, and Sabuka went on, "But that still makes it several hours since, and it _is_ the desert." Her voice cracked and died, illustrating her point. 

Ora looked irritated with herself and ducked into a doorway. Sabuka heard the murmur of a hurried conversation with the inhabitant and the woman came back with a canteen.

"Don't drink too fast," Ora warned as Sabuka tilted it back.

Sabuka came away coughing, but was careful not to spill any. It _was_ the desert.

"Keep the canteen. There's a well in the center of town. That's probably the best place to refill it," Ora said, starting down the hallway again.

"Because no one will refill it for me," said Sabuka flatly.

"On the contrary," Ora sighed. "If Gaara demanded water, they'd give it to him for fear of death, because he _would_ kill them if they refused. I believe that, due to your resemblance, they would have the same reaction. People are very, very suspicious, and" - her eyes hardened - "Gaara gave them a lot of reasons to be scared."

"The well is the best place," Sabuka repeated blandly, and left it at that.

--

Ora led Sabuka outside just to show her what the café looked like - if it could be called a café. It was, essentially, just an open air bar and several scattered tables with umbrellas spreading their webbed fingers to shield the casual customer from the sun. 

Sabuka took a deep breath of the refreshing, cooling night air. She shivered and Ora handed her a thick, blue-grey coat off a hook, slipping on a second one for herself. The cloth fell halfway down Sabuka's thighs, but it protected her from the penetrating chill.

"Desert nights get cold," Ora said, though Sabuka already knew this, "which is why I haven't yet gotten on her case for retaining your pants, since it took you long enough." Sabuka met her glare with a bland smile and didn't say anything.

A dry wind gusted and the red-haired girl pulled the coat tighter around her. "People show up at night?" She could only see one person at a table.

"Business is slow, but not nonexistent. We serve hot food and drinks once it gets cold. Those crazy enough to venture out in the freezing air or those without a home for the night, whatever the reason, come here more often than not."

Both seemed to apply to the sand ninja, so Sabuka asked the obvious question. "And Gaar - "

Ora anticipated the inquiry and answered it before it was completely out of Sabuka's mouth. "Gaara comes here, too."

Out of curiosity, Sabuka asked, "Do you charge him?"

"He is the Kazekage's son," said Ora stiffly. "I do not charge him." Recognizing when to let go for once, Sabuka simply nodded. 

Ora turned to lead the kunoichi back inside, but the girl hesitated. "Ora?"

"What?"

"Since it's only the crazy and the homeless who show up" - she glanced behind her; a few stragglers had shown up - "they can hardly complain about Gaara's new long-lost sister taking their orders, can they? And it's dark enough that maybe they won't be able to see me clearly."

Ora turned sharply and regarded Sabuka suspiciously. "Why?"

"I think dish-washing would drive me insane."

The woman watched her with narrowed eyes. "Night shift only," she allowed at last. 

Sabuka hid a smile and saluted; it was impossible to tell whether it was mocking or not. "Instruct me."

Ora directed her inside and immediately through a door. They were then behind the counter that served as the bar, although no one was drinking at it.

"Sabuka will take over for you," Ora informed a girl who was cloaked instead of coated. She nodded, pulled up her hood, and left; Ora turned to the only remaining person, a young man with sandy hair and emerald eyes.

"This is Sabuka Keiteri. She works here now and says dish-washing will drive her insane," the woman explained shortly. "Ryūken, deal with her. I have business to attend to." Then Ora stalked out.

Ryūken shoved a notebook and a pen into Sabuka's hands and pointed to a dazed-looking man at the counter, his own eyes cast downward, as if he were ashamed to look at her. "They come up," Ryūken explained to the ground. "They tell you what they want. You write it down. Put it here." He pointed to a ledge beneath a slot in the wall perpendicular to the door; Sabuka could see movement behind it. "Food, drinks come out there." He pointed to a larger, square hole beside it. "They hand you money, which you give to _me_." (The kunoichi thought that seemed pretty troublesome for both of them, but apparently newcomers weren't to be trusted.) "They go off to eat wherever. Sometimes you have to go collect dirty dishes, sometimes not."

Obviously finished, Ryūken shoved Sabuka toward the dazed man and went to help a seemingly impatient woman. "I won't eat you," Sabuka muttered at Ryūken, who still avoided looking at her, and went.

The man mumbled something that Sabuka was able to decipher reasonably well; she jotted it down, her handwriting a scrawl, but rather readable nonetheless. Dropping it off at the slot, where it quickly vanished, Sabuka then sidetracked over to Ryūken. She prodded him and waited for the customer to be helped so he could look at her.

"Am I to accept money, no matter the amount, or are there specific prices?"

Ryūken frowned at her, the rifled around in his coat pocket and pulled out a scroll with prices. Sabuka tucked it into her own pocket, but grabbed Ryūken's arm before he could turn away.

"Dirty dishes," she stated succinctly, since he obviously disliked talking to her. "Where?"

The young man pointed to a hole similar to the one that food allegedly came through, although the dish slot was in the wall parallel to the door. Sabuka nodded, retrieved the food slot's offering, checked its price one-handed, and delivered it.

The customer tossed Sabuka some coins; she looked sourly at them, then at Ryūken. The girl stalked over and slammed them on the counter by his elbow. 

Ryūken turned to glare at her. "Enough interrupt - " 

"I am not going to walk over here every time someone pays," Sabuka cut in. "It's ridiculous. I'm not going to steal your money."

"Fine," he snapped. Ripping the top page out of the notebook, Ryūken slapped it on the ledge and directed her to take care of a weary woman waiting at the counter. He strode out the door and returned a few minutes later with a cardboard box. The youth held it out irritably.

"There's a shelf under the counter. Keep it there."

Sabuka nodded shortly and took it. "_Thank_ you."

She spent the next hour or so taking and filling orders some of the time and standing around the rest of it. The majority of the time, Ryūken hurried out for the used plates, cups, and cutlery. Sabuka wasn't sure why, but she didn't particularly mind, although it would have been nice to walk around.

Suddenly, Ryūken swore. Sabuka looked up from the bored doodles in her notebook to see what was wrong; she caught fear in his emerald eyes. 

"Gaara's here. He doesn't come up; someone has to go to him."

Sabuka was around Ryūken and out the door before the sandy-haired youth could move, her call of "I got it" floating back.

--


	4. Chapter 4

Sabuka threaded her way through the tables, resisting the urge to insert snide remarks into the few desultory conversations of those around her. Crazy or homeless they may be, but she still didn't think they'd appreciate dry insults from the help.

Rather than sit in one of the café's chairs, Gaara had woven himself a seat of sand that allowed him to lean back and take the weight of the gourd off his shoulders without actually removing it. The expression on his face was one of cool disinterest, although Sabuka was sure she could still detect that hopeless sadness behind his icy mask.

The kunoichi cast her eyes toward the sandy ground and pretended not to look at him. But still, she peered up at the crimson hair and pale, cold eyes through her bangs.

"What can I get you today, sir?" Sabuka asked, as much as it killed her to call anyone 'sir'. Even if it was Gaara.

"Tea," he said, and his voice sent a shudder down her spine. "And oden." 

Sabuka scribbled it down and bobbed her head in what was definitely not a bow but obviously a gesture of respect. Then she returned to the room behind the counter to drop off the order.

The kunoichi went back to doodling absently, but her eyes remained surreptitiously on Gaara. _He looks so lonely..._

Tea and oden came sliding out of the food slot not long after. Sabuka snatched it and took it to Gaara.

Setting it on his table, Sabuka glanced around. There were currently no waiting customers; Ryūken was reading a book behind the counter.

Sabuka hesitated a moment longer, then slid into a chair across from Gaara. 

The sand shinobi paused with the tea halfway to his lips. "What are you doing?" he demanded coldly. Sand began to creep across the ground toward Sabuka's ankles.

She ignored it. "Sitting," was her cool response. The kunoichi recognized the dark-rimmed eyes for the insomnia that they represented, and she wondered just how little he slept for them to be so prominent.

"Go sit somewhere else. Now." From his expression and his tone, Sabuka knew he was used to being obeyed. 

She had just opened her mouth to reply when Ryūken barked across the night, "Keiteri."

Sabuka stood up, concealing a sigh. "I'll return shortly," she assured Gaara blandly, then went to see what was up.

Two more customers had showed, but that was only Ryūken's excuse. In a low voice, he demanded, "What the hell are you doing?"

"I'm flattered by your worry for me," said Sabuka, batting her eyelashes mockingly at him. "But I was only sitting." 

"You were _not_ 'only sitting'. _You_ were _sitting_ at the _same_ table as _Gaara_." 

"Emphasize a few less syllables and you'll be speaking in iambic pentameter," Sabuka advised. As Ryūken turned furious, she muttered, "No, pentameter is only ten syllables a line... some kind of iambic meter, at least, if he gets it just right... but he's sort of combining anapestic and dactylic... but no." The girl sighed to herself. "He's just not poetic enough."

Sabuka handed a woman her cup of hot cocoa and returned to Gaara's table.

--

"You are a fool," Gaara told her icily as she sat down. Sand twined about her wrists; the kunoichi wondered if it was to keep her there, to warn her, or to remind her that he could kill her with a moment's thought. Probably a little of all three.

"I've been called that," Sabuka agreed. "I've also been called worse. Like _shinobi_." 

Gaara's pale, dead eyes bored into her. "What are you implying?"

Sabuka countered his question with another. "What's the twenty-fifth rule of Shinobi Conduct?" When he didn't answer, she went on, "'No matter what happens, true shinobi must never, ever show their emotions. The mission is the only priority. Carry that in your heart. And never, never shed a tear.' Not only are shinobi fools, they try to be inhuman fools."

As soon as she said the words, Sabuka regretted them. Looking at Gaara, she knew he _was_ inhuman, and she could see how hard he tried to hide his emotions. She could see just by looking into his eyes.

But Gaara said nothing.

The silence stretched between them. Around her wrists, the sand tightened enough to be chafing. Gaara seemed to prefer the silence, using it to eat.

"Tell me about your past," Sabuka said abruptly.

Gaara paused. "Fools can't tell me what to do."

"No one tells you what to do."

"Yes," Gaara agreed.

"Fine." Sabuka rolled her eyes, skirting danger. "I beg you, Your Majesty, tell me, if it pleases you."

He regarded her silently, expression frosty.

Sabuka sighed. "Please?" 

Still he said nothing, only took a drink of his tea.

The kunoichi also sat in silence. Begging Gaara would only irritate him. 

"Why do you want to know?" he asked finally, and Sabuka was surprised to hear a note of bitterness.

The kunoichi chose her words carefully. "All I know about you is that there is a demon inside of you and almost everyone is afraid of you."

"Keiteri!"

Ryūken again. Sabuka made to stand up and found that, not only was the sand cutting into her wrists, her ankles were bound to the earth by golden chains. 

Gaara's eyes narrowed. "You think to laugh at me?" Blood lust and fury turned his face to that of a murderer. "You think to torment me because of my past like all the others?" 

"No," said Sabuka matter-of-factly, refusing to show her fear. She stood perfectly still, too, as if he were a wounded animal that needed calming. Nor did she say anything else, avoiding digging a deeper hole (for once).

"Keiteri!" Ryūken shouted again. Apparently, he didn't see her bindings. 

"Duty calls," Sabuka said regretfully. "I do work here, you know. It's not all leisurely conversation." 

"Who are you?" Gaara hissed.

Sabuka took a deep, quavering breath. "I'm not really sure, to be perfectly honest with you," she confessed quietly. "I don't know where I came from anymore. My mother was a... is dead. My father is dead. As far as I know, every member of my family is dead. But basically, the only things for sure about myself are my name and... that I'm shinobi. But a shinobi without a headband and a home village is a shinobi without an... identity."

Gaara looked taken aback, his warped mask temporarily shattered, but Sabuka figured that was because he'd expected nothing more than a name. The sand had fallen from her ankles and wrists; Sabuka took a step away. She walked backwards until she crashed into a table, breathed deeply, and whispered, "I'm called Sabuka Keiteri." Then the kunoichi turned around and walked away.

--

"Took you long enough," Ryūken snapped. Apparently, he was already accustomed to her presence, because he yelled at her to her face instead of the ground. Or maybe he was just really angry.

"I was held up by my new friend," Sabuka said loftily.

"Gaara is no one's friend," spat the sandy-haired youth.

"I didn't say he was the one who delayed me either," the kunoichi replied ambiguously, setting down a stack of used dishes in front of the correct hole.

Ryūken glared at her. She ignored him, instead pulling a couple of coins out her pocket. "Someone left these on the table with their dishes. Did one of your customers forget to pay?"

Disbelievingly, the young man stared at Sabuka. "Have you never worked a restaurant or café in your life?"

"I'm a ninja, not a waitress," snapped the kunoichi.

"It's called a _tip_. Extra spending money for the one who cleans up." He said each word as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Have you never even been out to eat?"

It suddenly dawned on Sabuka why Ryūken always went after the plates. "I'm a ninja, not a food critic." _There was never enough time or money. Especially money._

"I don't believe you. Ninjas wear headbands and get paid for their missions."

"Believe or don't believe whatever you want. It doesn't make it any more or less true." 

Ryūken looked sourly at her as she returned the money to her pocket. Sabuka disregarded the expression. "Is there a reason you called me away from my lovely conversation?"

"We're closing, it's after midnight. I'll hang around and clean up the last of the dishes when the stragglers are done. You can go off and do whatever _ninjas_ do." He smirked at the word; Sabuka rolled her eyes.

"I will, thanks," she responded sweetly as Ryūken pulled down a sort of curtain made of flat strips of wood. It latched to the counter on the edges; Ryūken shoved Sabuka out the room's door and locked it.

"Go home, little ninja," the sandy-haired youth sneered. Sabuka didn't bother to tell him that she lived in Ora's expansive house now, and he shut the outside door, too, leaving her standing out in the cold.

--

Ryūken hadn't locked the door, so Sabuka could have gone back inside if she really wanted to. In fact, she knew his whole act was pretty much just for show, because he'd said he was going to hang around and clean up.

But she didn't really want to go back inside, despite the chill. Thoughts of sleep had just begun to touch her brain, tentative spikes of weariness. It was not her desire to give in to them just yet.

Sabuka wandered away from the door, then paused. It would serve Ryūken right if she simply took all the money from the tables so he couldn't have it. The play was a childish one, and she wasn't usually a particularly spiteful person, but...

She did it anyway.

Then, because it established persistent pangs of guilt within her, she began stacking the used tableware. The kunoichi carried them back to the building and set them on the part of the counter that was outside the shutter. As she worked, the last few people got up to leave, although Gaara remained, finishing his tea.

When Sabuka had cleaned up all tables but Gaara's, she began to walk slowly, head down, toward the sand shinobi. Abruptly, he stood, his tea gone, enough caffeine downed to keep him awake through another night. Sabuka gathered up his cup and bowl while he walked away; no coin graced the table's sandy surface. She hadn't expected one to.

The kunoichi dropped off the empty dishes and turned to look back at Gaara. He was just turning a corner; the sight of his gourd was the last to go.

Sabuka hesitated for many, many moments, so many that she was sure he would be long gone before she made up her mind.

She shouldn't. She would be in danger of losing her life. She knew that all too well. Gaara was not a kind or merciful person. He was not even a stable person. He was a hurt person, and he seemed to desire that he remain that way. He was a loner and would not appreciate her interference.

Sabuka paused for one more moment. Then she took off running.

And even as her feet thundered across the ground - or perhaps that was just her heartbeat - her footsteps were completely silent, stealthy, as a ninja's should be.

--


	5. Chapter 5

She might have been flying across the sand. Her earlier experiences with chakra and running obviously didn't deter the kunoichi; her speed was evidence of that.

She took each turn at a breakneck pace. It occurred to her briefly that she was thoroughly lost, but it didn't bother her.

Sabuka hadn't a clue where she was going either. She could hardly followed the sand to find Gaara; this was the desert, after all.

A shuffling sounded from around a building's corner in front of her. Hesitantly, Sabuka stepped toward it. "Gaara?"

The shuffling came from behind her now, too. Swearing, Sabuka spun, knowing she'd been caught, but not by the sand shinobi.

Ten of them. There were ten of them out wandering the frigid air after midnight. They must really hate her. 

But she could see fear in every man's eyes.

"Rawr, I'm going to eat you," Sabuka said dryly. Surprisingly, a few of them actually flinched.

"Okay," the kunoichi asked wryly, "what am I being persecuted for? I haven't killed or even hurt anyone."

"One Gaara in this village is already too many," snarled the tallest man of the group.

Sabuka looked annoyed. "What resemblance do I bear to Gaara besides hair and eye color?" she demanded.

"That alone is enough!"

The kunoichi let out an exasperated sigh. "What about Gaara's actual relatives?"

Apparently, logic was too much for the men to handle. Rather than reply, half of them charged.

Sabuka ducked a wild swipe and dropped into a sweeping kick, knocking the speaker off his feet. She came up into an uppercut to another man's stomach that smashed the wind out of him, then reversed the motion into a back elbow strike to take out a third. However, they recovered semi-quickly, once they get their breath back, and a few more stormed from the shadows.

Damn. They _really_ didn't like her.

She didn't have _time_ for this. She had wasted enough time getting lost, and she had know way of knowing whether Gaara would stick around. She had to find him, catch him.

Sabuka downed some more men - back kick, side kick, front snap kick, come down, reverse roundhouse, down, step behind side kick, reverse punch.

They kept coming.

"This is ridiculous," she snapped. "Enough." Thus far, the kunoichi had avoided doing any real damage, but she was getting fed up, and this had to end. "Go away. I think I'm catching stupid." 

The insult went completely over their heads, she was certain, but they did catch that it was an insult, at least. It made them angrier.

She really had to learn to stop getting herself into more trouble when she should be getting into less.

"Alright. Time to bring in the _power_," Sabuka muttered. Her hands came together, then apart sharply, together, across, over, and under each other in extremely complex hand seals.

"_Akatsuki no Kage_ - Shadow of the Red Moon!"

Abruptly, the kunoichi disappeared. She left nothing but a silhouette of Sabuka, a silhouette of a hue darker than the deepest black.

A silhouette with very bright, eerie crimson eyes...

Wary, the men stopped advancing. Although, to their credit, they didn't retreat either.

The shadowy profile began to grow. Or rather, it began to stretch, increasing in height, yet not increasing or decreasing in width. But the eyes, slit-pupilled like a cat's, widened, and the full moon in the sky turned a brilliant, bloody scarlet.

Terrified, the attackers scattered. Now the silhouette shrank, until it left Sabuka kneeling wearily on the ground.

Making a mental note to never use that technique for intimidation again - it took far too much chakra to activate and deactivate without actually attacking - Sabuka made an effort to stand. It was a good effort, though it sent her stumbling into the wall for support. Nonetheless, she was standing, if barely. 

The kunoichi prayed that the men didn't come back. Because, between running and intimidating, she was clean out of chakra. Again. 

Sabuka took a few stumbling steps, then realized she didn't have to go any farther, because sand was creeping toward her despite the lack of wind. For some reason, she couldn't decide whether this was good or bad.

"You're more of a fool than I thought," hissed the voice of ice. Sabuka winced.

"How much did you think?" she asked tentatively.

Gaara didn't step from the shadows that coated him, but, eerily, Sabuka could see his eyes. Their gaze pierced through her own like icicles, and she flinched.

"Wandering the night in a town full of people who despise you for what you are... foolish."

"How does that make me any different from you?" asked Sabuka quietly - and foolishly.

"The sand is in my control!" Gaara snarled. As if responding to his words, the sand rose from the ground, a gritty monster with no form at all. Sabuka swore as it wrapped itself around her and began to squeeze.

There was nothing she could do as she felt sand cut into her body. Blood trickled across her skin and the grit flowed into her wounds. Sabuka gritted her teeth, although she couldn't hold back a pained whimper. She felt her left arm shatter and almost screamed.

Something tickled her face. Sabuka's eyes widened in fear. The sand was rising. 

A sharp sting under her eyes startled the kunoichi; something wet slid down her skin. She licked her lips: Blood. Yes, the sand was rising.

She almost begged, but then she stopped. She wouldn't.

"I saved your life in Konoha," Sabuka said hoarsely instead. "Spare mine."

"Fools cannot tell me what to do." But his voice quavered and his eyes widened and the sand fell away.

Then Gaara was gone and Sabuka sank, bleeding, to the dusty earth.

--

"Damn, I hurt," Sabuka moaned without opening her eyes. It was a bit of an understatement; every bone, muscle, joint, and inch of skin was on fire with anguish. She didn't bother trying to move; besides the fact that it seemed impossible just now, she didn't particularly desire the additional pain it was guaranteed to bring.

"Well, it's nice to know, but I'm pretty sure I could figure it out by looking at you." The voice was not Ora's; it was too young, and it was somewhat darker, sadder.

"Dry sarcasm," croaked Sabuka, "is my job." She cracked one eye to peer at the speaker.

It was the cloaked girl from the café. In the flickering candlelight, Sabuka could make out a waved waterfall of brown hair that was a shade away from black and bottomless, blue-violet eyes.

"I'm a medical ninja," the girl explained. "Your left arm is shattered. I can fix it." 

"My left arm?" Sabuka sat up in a hurry; a sharp pain jolted throughout her body and she gasped.

"Your left arm," the girl confirmed. Her eyes had gone blank - literally; her pupils had vanished. Her pale hand hovered over Sabuka's left limb, just below the elbow, where a wire-thin, white scar encircled the kunoichi's arm.

The healing hand glowed a deep violet; Sabuka felt a sliding sensation beneath her skin as the fragments of bone apparently rearranged and fused. However, she experienced no lessening of pain.

Her pupils returned to normal, the medical ninja stood up. She almost seemed to glide to the door, rather than walking.

Just before the girl stepped out, she paused. Without turning her head, she murmured, "As long as it remains up to me, your secret will be a secret still." 

Sabuka swore. The healer left.

--

"Are you feeling any better?"

"Apart from the pain in my arms, legs, head, ribs, and everywhere else, yes, I'm doing quite well." Despite the jibe, Sabuka's response to Ora was decidedly halfhearted. She was worried, frightened even. She had no reason to trust the healer, who shouldn't have known anyway.

"Didn't the medic come?"

"Yeah, she did," Sabuka assured the woman. "But she only took care of my broken arm." 

Ora frowned. "Perhaps that took all the chakra she had," the woman muttered to herself.

Sabuka very much doubted this was the case. She had not sensed a great deal of chakra in the medical ninja. On the contrary, she had sensed none at all, yet the girl had gone on to heal a shattered bone. To the red-haired kunoichi, this meant the healer was powerful enough to hide it. There would have been plenty of chakra to heal with.

So there was a better reason. In fact, remembering the medic's parting words, Sabuka could already think of one.

It was so, so much easier to hide scores of tiny scars among fresh wounds.

--

Sabuka crossed her arms as if she were cold, although she was actually quite warm. Despite the room's lack of windows and the resulting darkness, she would guess it to be about midafternoon. Now, the question was whether it was the day she had followed Gaara or some day after. 

Questions: They were the reason she huddled as if against cold, covering the wire-thin scar with one hand. Because it would bring up questions, questions she had no adequate answers to. And, though the thought had not worried her before the medic's words, now she feared that someone would recognize what it really meant.

"Can I get some clothes?" the kunoichi inquired. "There's barely enough left of these to even call them rags."

It was no hyperbole; the shredded remains of her clothing hung from Sabuka's body, barely covering her decently. Despite the semi-relief from the heat that it may provide, she had no desire to wander around half-naked.

"Wrap the sheet around you," Ora ordered, "and come. The only reason you're here is that our medical ninja prefers to work in semi-darkness. There's a change of clothes in your room."

"When did it become _my_ room?" Sabuka asked interestedly.

Ora shrugged. "When you got here. It was empty; now it's yours. Come."

Cloaking herself in the sandy, somewhat bloody, ivory sheet, Sabuka followed. 

--

Blessedly, her old, black shirt remained on the floor beside her pallet. Sabuka hurried over to it and tore another strip off, once more knotting it about her arm.

"Still in mourning?" Ora inquired, as if the kunoichi shouldn't be. 

"It doesn't go away just because I had a brush with death," Sabuka responded.

Wearily, the kunoichi flopped onto the pallet. "Sorry about your clothes. It wasn't very considerate of me to shred them the day you gave them to me." 

Again, Ora shrugged. "Don't do it again. If you can promise that, you're back on Night Shift. You've already skipped one. You have a few hours until you have to go."

"What should I do 'til then?"

Ora looked at her. "Keep reading?" she suggested. Sabuka winced.

"You didn't find it interesting?"

"I already knew most of the information," the kunoichi admitted.

The woman looked surprised. "How? Have you read it somewhere else?"

"I..." Sabuka looked down. It was as she had told Gaara. _...without an identity..._

"I am a shinobi," she whispered.

"You wear no headband," Ora pointed out, as many already had.

Sabuka smiled wryly. "I lost it in the desert. Quicksand. Figured I could always get a new one, but not a new life." The kunoichi's hand brushed her thigh.

"And I lost my shuriken in the attack... also my money to get more."

"Maybe you'll get lucky and collect more tonight. If you don't want to read, find something else to do. _In your room._"

"Yes, Ora," Sabuka said humbly. The woman looked at her suspiciously, but pivoted to leave anyway.

"Er," began Sabuka hesitantly, bring Ora up short. "Does Gaara usually come every night?" At the woman's narrowed eyes, the kunoichi added hastily, "I thought I should know, to make it easier to stay out of his way."

"Sometimes he comes," Ora said shortly. "Sometimes he doesn't. I don't work Night Shift. Ryūken would know if there was more of a pattern." Then the woman stalked out.

And Ryūken, Sabuka reflected, was not likely to tell her anything.

--

The shorts were the same she had been offered before, although she rejected them in favor of long, dark grey pants better-suited to the night's chill. An ivory t-shirt with elbow-length sleeves went under a thick blue-grey jacket, identical to the previous once.

Sabuka had a good head for directions and easily remembered the way to the café area. Ryūken glared at her as she entered the room behind the counter, obviously irritated at seeing her back.

"What happened to you?" he sneered.

Sabuka figured that he already knew where the cuts on her face - and, though they were hidden by clothing, the wounds on her arms and legs - had come from. He just wanted to gloat.

"I made a mistake," she replied mildly. "Actually, several subsequent mistakes." 

"I thought you were a _ninja_," Ryūken smirked.

"Yeah, but ninjas aren't infallible," Sabuka said irritably. "Or inhuman, much as they try to be. Everyone makes mistakes. Even you, Oh Most Powerful and Wise One, ninja though you're _not_." 

Annoyed, Ryūken yanked open the shuttered, his face stormy. Sabuka retrieved her notebook and pen from under the counter and took the first order.

--  
On the translation of _Akatsuki_:  
According to the Wikipedia article on Akatsuki, which is the criminal organization of villains in Naruto (for those who don't know what I'm talking about, it's the organization that Sasuke's brother, Itachi, is part of), the word itself means 'Dawn' or 'Daybreak'. I'm not disputing this fact. However, if you split the word into its two separate words, _aka_ and _tsuki_, it means 'Red Moon'. _Aka_ translates to 'red' or 'bloody red' and _tsuki_ translates to 'moon'


	6. Chapter 6

Since Ryūken worked between her and the door, the majority of the time, he made it out to the tips before she did. However, he was occasionally busy with one of the meager customers, and Sabuka was able to slip outside.

Gaara didn't show.

Apparently, there was no set closing time for the café, but there were approaching it nonetheless. Sabuka wasn't sure how much a new shuriken holster, plus the accompanying weapons, would cost to an outsider, but she was pretty certain the money in her possession was not enough.

Ryūken was just about to slam the shutter closed when a swirl of sand adorned the edge of the pool of light. Gaara had come.

Sabuka didn't hesitate. If she had, Ryūken would have been out there, as much as he didn't want to be. Only after she was on her way to Gaara's table did Sabuka debate the wisdom of her decision. By then, it was too late.

"How can I help you tonight, sir?"

Gaara turned his cold, piercing gaze on her. "I could kill you where you stand," he said in a low, dangerous voice.

"Yes, sir. What would you like?"

"Some might call you brave for coming back," he hissed. "But - "

"But most would call me fool, including you," Sabuka interrupted, dropping the servile act. "Did you actually want to order something, or did you just come to gloat?"

Sand twined around her. _Damn. Me and my big mouth._

"I am under no obligation to spare you. Last time was on my whim alone..."

"Good," said Sabuka calmly. "Then the blood debt has not been repaid, and I can use the life that you owe me this time. Please don't destroy my clothes again. I only have them because of charity, and my debts to Ms. Kaido are piling up."

"I don't owe you anything!" Gaara snarled. "The predator does not owe anything to the prey!"

Sabuka now wore a golden, gritty robe of sand; her panic was not far below the surface. However, she maintained self-control as best she could.

"Would you like the same thing as last time, or something else, sir?"

For a moment, she thought he was going to leave. But apparently, the insomniac needed his caffeine, and he sank down, a sandy chair rising to meet him.

"Tea," he whispered wearily, "and oden." Then his eyes hardened. "And don't come back out here, or I _will_ kill you."

--

"You must have a terrible memory," Ryūken snapped, "if you've already forgotten what happened last time."

"Mine's obviously better than yours," Sabuka retorted, "because I remember that I only got hurt when I went out after him. But," she added, "you better deliver the food. I'm inclined to take his threats seriously."

Ryūken snatched the order when it came out and stormed outside, though he softened his step near Gaara. Sabuka gazed after him, but remained sensible. Though she technically _hadn't_ promised Ora that she wouldn't follow Gaara, it was safer to wait.

So the kunoichi stayed inside.

--

"Am I going to be forced into dishwashing?" Sabuka asked blearily as hot desert sun shone on her closed eyelids. No one answered, because no one was in the room, so Sabuka rolled over and tried to go back to sleep.

Half an hour later, her eyelids were weighted closed and her brain was slipping into dormancy when something thudded into her back.

"That is the _second_ time you've done that," Sabuka admonished into her pillow, "and I'd appreciate if you refrained from doing it again."

"Then get up before I come in here," said Ora.

"I was up half an hour ago," Sabuka protested. Remembering the question she had asked when she first awoke, the kunoichi repeated it.

"Not unless you want to be," Ora responded. "You'll be forced out to run errands otherwise."

"Works for me." Sabuka rolled over and sat up. The package that had hit her turned out to be two scrolls and a pouch of money. One scroll was a list and the other was a map.

"I can do this."

"Good."

--

Sabuka exchanged the simple black clothing she had worn to bed for yet another short-sleeved white top and knee-length, light grey shorts. Both were too large, but she belted them with a length of rope found in what seemed to be the junk drawer of the dresser.

Outside, the streets were almost empty, undoubtedly due to the heat. She was pretty crazy to be out herself at this time of day; sweat trickled into her eyes as the kunoichi peered at the map.

Every once in a while, Sabuka would duck into a shop to pick up what Ora needed. The shopkeepers were usually wary of her, at the very least, but Sabuka was courteous and remembered to curb her tongue; often, they relaxed slightly.  
When Ora's errands were done, Sabuka searched for a little while until she found a shinobi supplier. It was a small place, dark and cool; giant shuriken and enormous swords adorned the walls, although they were mostly for show.

The kunoichi strolled around the room, pretending to ignore the woman who was leaning against the wall, reading a scroll, and idly twirling a kunai. The woman glanced up and raked her eyes across Sabuka: Taking in her lack of headband, no doubt.

"What do you want?" the woman asked coolly.

"Just looking," Sabuka replied blandly.

"You're too old to begin shinobi training. There's nothing here for non-shinobi."

All she said was, "I'm younger than I look."

For a few minutes, Sabuka wandered around, examining the large weapons. When she'd judged a suitable amount of time to have passed, the kunoichi said, "Headbands."

"What?"

"Hitai-ate. Ninja headbands. Can I get one here?"

"Only shinobi can wear those," the woman said nastily. "You can't just get one."

"I _am_ a shinobi. I lost my headband in the desert on the way here."

"We give headbands to _shinobi_ from our _own_ village. Go home to get a new one." The shopkeeper obviously didn't believe the younger kunoichi.

"Fine," Sabuka said mildly. "Then I need shuriken and a new holster."

"Look," said the woman irritably. "I can't go giving out tools to each and every kid who wants to play ninja, or to any person stopping by who wants to impersonate a shinobi. Go away."

"What if I show you that I can manipulate chakra?"

"That proves nothing. You could be only a student at the Academy."

"But you could sell me weapons," Sabuka said somewhat triumphantly, sounding satisfied. She raised one hand in front of her face, her middle and first fingers in the air, the others folded. The area around them began to shimmer crimson; it shivered, and a glowing sphere detached from the aura.

Sabuka continued to manipulate it into a variety of shapes. In the end, the woman grudgingly sold her shuriken and holster, and the younger kunoichi had some money left after all, so she bought kunai and pouch, too.

--

That night, Gaara did not come to the café at all. When she slipped into dreams an hour past midnight, the kunoichi dreamed of chasing the sand shinobi through an endless cavern, and even though he was moving as slowly as ice melts she she was running, he still kept getting farther and farther away. Sand swirled around her, but it did not attack her, because she was controlling it, except that it wasn't _listening_ to her.

Then Gaara turned to face her at last, but before Sabuka could cry that she only wanted to know what had happened to him, the sand turned on her and closed around her and killed her in a spray of gold-spattered scarlet.

--

Sabuka leapt from the pallet, shedding the sheet that had a stranglehold on her in the same was as a snake sheds its skin. Her bare feet slapped against the gritty floor; she didn't know where to find Ora at this time of night, but she did know that she had to.

Or maybe she didn't.

Sabuka skidded to a stop, her momentum carrying her into a wall. There was no time, no time at all, to search this maze of a building.

She pivoted and raced back to her room. Scrabbling through the junk drawer in her dresser, she extracted a bent piece of paper and a decidedly contrite pen.

With frequent shaking of the pen, Sabuka finally got a somewhat-sketchy note scratched out. She dropped it on her pillow.

_Ora -  
Thanks.  
It's the only word I have. For once.  
__Sabuka Keiteri_

Quickly, she changed and fished the last few coins from her pocket, dropping them by the note. Making sure the black cloth was tired securely around her arm, Sabuka fled the house.

Gaara had left town.

--

Beneath her bare feet, the sand was icy grit. She shivered uncontrollably in the bone-chilling cold of the desert, her teeth chattering nonstop. Why hadn't she at least grabbed _socks_?

She had no way to know where he'd gone, no way to follow, and no way to know how long ago he'd left. The desert was no small place: Miles and miles of sand stretched away from her.

Deciding she had to waste chakra or freeze to death, Sabuka concentrated it into her feet once more. Oh, was she a fool.

"Gaara?"

A frigid night breeze carried her words across the sandy expanse; they echoed in the emptiness, then fell flat, unanswered.

--

Sand wove its way into her cardinal red hair as she lay flat on her back, arms splayed. The brilliance of the stars was fading in a glorious evanescence as the sun began to rise above the golden horizon. Her throat was so dry that she could barely swallow, but at least, the kunoichi reflected, she would be warm soon. Then she would be burning again, but before that, she'd be warm.

She was _not_ going to survive this day.

Sabuka, slowly as stone erodes, got to her feet. Stumbling a little - and once again, free of chakra, having used it all to keep her warm through the night - she began to walk in a random direction, any random direction.

--

Several hours later, she was surprised that she wasn't yet dead. She was, however, lying on the ground, having given up on reaching any sort of destination. Actually, she had basically given up on moving at all, and was mumbling to herself, although it made her thirstier. While she had been sensible enough to grab her canteen, it hadn't been full, and it was gone.

"S'not a bad place to die, the desert. Kin see for miles, y'can, miles of glittering gold, like treasure. And the sky's such a... an excruciating blue. You kin see it all. Especially," she added, still sharp enough to catch it, "when the sand moves toward you by itself."

The sand kept moving, but it wasn't that close anyway - nevermind the fact that sand was actually all around her - so she closed her eyes and ignored it.

She dreamed that a shadow moved over her, except that she wasn't really asleep, so it was actually just wishful thinking again. But when she opened her eyes, it was neither, because Gaara was standing over her.

They stared at each other, Sabuka's gaze slightly wild, Gaara's sharper and colder than ever.

"Gonna kill me now?" Sabuka rasped.

"Yes."

"Right. Wait a minute while I stand please. I don't mind dying in the desert, but I'd rather be killed on my feet."

As she struggled to rise, the kunoichi whispered hoarsely, "Sorry, mother." But it was quiet enough that Gaara didn't hear.

In a circle around her, ten writhing, grainy snakes formed from the sand. Just as they lunged, Sabuka raised her left arm so that the gritty fangs sank into her scar.

--

Blood spiraled from the opened scar, while her other wounds simply bled normally. Sabuka's left arm hung limply, but her right arm bent across it, palm facing outward. The hovering blood twined around her rigid fingers almost lovingly; Sabuka narrowed her eyes in concentration and it began coating her in an unnaturally deep crimson robe.

The feeling of being wrapped in her own blood was absolutely vile; Sabuka dry-retched violently. Gaara's sand continued to barrage her, but it no longer inflicted any wounds, bouncing off instead.

Eventually, the crimson rose to cover her face, pouring into her mouth, her nose, her eyes. She looked like she was underwater in an ocean of blood.

Then, before she could stop it, a thick tentacle shot from the coating, its glistening scarlet point aimed straight for Gaara's heart.

--


	7. Chapter 7

"No!" Sabuka yelled, but she could not control the blood. It burst through a thousand walls of sand that rose to meet it, and there was nothing that could stop it.

"Mother, please!" the kunoichi screamed. "Stop!"

She fumbled through the blood coating for her kunai pouch. She did not know what she could so, if the blood was not already satisfied by her open wounds, but she had to try.

The kunoichi struggled to cut through the blood seal on her pal, but it would not give beneath the blade. Gaara was backing away, but the tentacle was moving faster and faster. 

"Mother!" Sabuka screamed again, but the tentacle did not stop.

Disregarding the consequences, Sabuka dredged up every last bit of chakra she could find and forced it into the kunai as she brought it down.

The blood coating her left hand rent with a squelch and the blade bit deep into her palm.

As her own blood spurted into the unnatural, the tentacle continued to move toward Gaara, but it slowed. Feet, inches, centimeters were left until it pierced his flesh. Yet as it slowed, it oozed, dripping to the ground, and Gaara quickly put distance between it and him. At last it was just a lethargic slug, creeping along, and then it soaked into the earth, leaving a swath of crimson stretching across the gold.

Freed from her protective coat, Sabuka knelt. Then, unable to support herself, she fell.

--

When she woke up, her throat was drier than the sand she lay upon and Gaara was standing over her. Idly, Sabuka wondered if he ever got tired.

"I have one question that you will answer before I kill you," he said harshly.

"That's not much motivation to answer," Sabuka quipped wearily.

"Why did you repeatedly scream for your mother to stop? She is dead, you told me."

"She is," Sabuka confirmed. Carefully, she raised herself into a half-sitting position, reflecting distantly that she would be dead if not for the blood that had spilled into her mouth.

The kunoichi brought her attention back to the shinobi of sand. His eyes bored into hers, but she did not look away.

"I will explain," Sabuka said cautiously, "if you will tell me _your_ past."

She expected argument. Instead, she got history. 

Sabuka listened with growing horror as Gaara dispassionately told her of the hate and fear he unfairly endured, of attempted murders by his own family - by the one person who'd expressed any care at all. There was no emotion in his voice as he spoke of the binding of the demon, the death of his mother, of the fear and the all-around pain he'd suffered through. She heard no emotion, but she saw it, deep in his eyes, an icy fire of rage and confusion and despair.

And finally, she thought she understood this boy and his desire to kill every living being but himself. He was not evil, and while he might be a monster, it was only because others had made him so. He had been shaped by expectation, the expectations of everyone around him.

Love might be on his forehead, but hate was in his heart.

Forgetting herself and who she was talking to, Sabuka whispered, horrified, "How do you live?"

Gaara just looked at her, the ice in his gaze almost tangible. "By killing."

"Right." Sabuka quietly took a deep breath. "My turn."

But she didn't know where to begin.

--

"My mother... is dead." _Way to keep him interested by telling him something he doesn't know. _"Before that, she was..." If Sabuka had been talking to anyone else, she would have said 'alive', but she wasn't willing to test his patience. 

"Oh, gods, how do I describe this?" Exhausted, Sabuka flopped back down and stared at the sky, wondering just how curious Gaara really was.

"Do you have any water?" she asked hoarsely, having used hers up long ago.

Coolly, he unhooked a canteen and tossed it to her. Startled, she caught it, but only barely, and I drank.

"Alright," Sabuka sighed. "I'll try again."

--

"I guess you could say my mother was a demon, but not in the same way that the Shukaku inside of you is a demon. Her techniques centered around blood, mostly others'. She was near unbeatable, because everyone has blood, and she could manipulate it.

"But any who revel in the blood of others can't be in complete control of their insanity." Sabuka's face darkened. "I think she even began to... I dunno what word - adopt? - some of the memories and emotions of those whose blood she retained.

"She exploded. Killed a lot of people, including the rest of my family. She tried to kill me."

As a visual, the kunoichi raised her left arm, showing the scar, and also indicated the spattering of tiny scars across her legs.

"But she woke up. Sort of. She saw it was me. And she poured her Lifeblood into me through the wound in my arm."

Sabuka glanced up, just to see Gaara's reaction. There wasn't one. She looked back at the ground.

"That was her blood. The attack. I though I could make her stop, like last time. But it was too hungry. 'Til I gave it more of my own." 

She had no idea why he cared so much about her mother. But then, she didn't know that _his_ only mother was the sand he carried with him always.

"Anyway, I haven't a clue where I'm from, because... Well, I think I took on some of mom's memories like she used to do. Except that I was no blood ninja, and.. I dunno, the chakras clashed, or something, and canceled each other out. Some weird phenomenon like that. I'm surprised I even remember the... transfer, considering the amount of my life that I lost."

"And now you will lose the rest," Gaara hissed, either satisfied that her story was done or unwilling to hear more, "when you die at my feet."

"Oh," Sabuka sighed. "Not this again."

--

This time, she had no defense.

She watched it rise with grim regret, but not fear. Not anymore.

"I don't suppose you'd let me call in the life debt for saving your life?" she tried hopefully, but half-heartedly.

"_You_ were the attacker," Gaara snarled.

"Technically, it was my mother."

"No. I don't owe you anything," he said coldly. "The prey owes the predator... its life." 

"Yeah, that's what I thought," Sabuka sighed as she watched the sand hide the sky and come down in a deadly wave.

--

Her mind drifted out of unconsciousness; her eyes opened and strayed to the gritty blackness where the sky should have been. She was in extreme discomfort, but there was no doubt that she was alive.

The kunoichi lay there for countless hours and decided that either Gaara had decided to torment her longer or something had happened to him. 

She also decided that she was about to die of thirst once again.

"This sucks," said Sabuka to no one in particular.

After a few more minutes of staring at the shadows that were her sky - as well as her ground, her walls, and her general surroundings - Sabuka heard muffled voices through the thick sand. The only words she could make out were "Earth Style"; a moment later, the ground near her exploded.

The kunoichi waited a second. Naruto poked his head through the hole and said, "Come through the tunnel." Then he disappeared in a puff of ivory smoke: A clone.

Sabuka sighed. "Of all the techniques he could have been good at," she muttered, "it had to have been the one where he made copies of himself." 

Then she crawled over to the hole and slid into it.

-- 

On the other side, all of Squad 7 stood arrayed before her. Sasuke's arms were crossed coldly, his face masked by ice almost as cold as Gaara's; all traces of the almost friendliness he had previously shown to her were gone. Sakura was looking rather spacey, Naruto was looking as triumphant as if her had single-handedly rescued her, and Kakashi was reading.

"Does anyone have water?" Sabuka asked hoarsely.

Without looking up, Kakashi tossed her a canteen., obviously brought along just for her. Sabuka drank gratefully, trying not to go so fast as to choke. Pausing, she looked around.

"Okay, I'll bite. What're you all doing here?"

"Hokage sent us to talk to Kazekage about Gaara," explained Sakura helpfully.

"It's because I'm on this team!" boasted Naruto. "Hokage knows I can handle that browless freak!"

"Look who's talking," said Sabuka nastily. "If I were you, I'd watch who I was calling 'freak'." Sasuke, almost imperceptibly, smirked.

Kakashi finally looked up, tucking away his book. "We've already been. To see the Kazekage, that is. Then a Ms. Kaido informed us that you'd gone out into the desert virtually unprepared."

Sabuka nodded dismissively. "What does the Hokage expect the Kazekage to do about it?"

"I don't know, but whatever it is, he's not doing it. He insisted that he'd lost enough shinobi in assassination attempts already, and that he can do nothing more."

"He should have figured it out sooner," Sabuka muttered. "Fool."

"Look who's talking," said Naruto annoyingly. "You, the one who went into the desert alone!"

"I'm surprised you expected to find me alive," the kunoichi remarked, taking another drink.

"We really didn't," said Sasuke coolly, speaking for the first time. "Personally, I expected a week-old corpse." Nevermind that she hadn't been alone in the desert for a whole week.

Sabuka winced. "Thanks for the vote of confidence." Realizing that her arm was exposed, her hand twitched, almost moving to cover her scar. But she repressed the urge; that would only draw more attention to it. For now, it was coated in blood and hopefully hidden.

The kunoichi sat, cross-legged, in the sand. "Many thanks. See you around." 

"Aren't you coming back to Konoha?" asked Sakura, confused.

"I'd never make it," said Sabuka brightly. "I'm completely out of chakra, and I'd never be able to walk all that way. A few minutes ago, I was dying of dehydration." As if to remind them, the kunoichi took another long drink.

"A bunch of my Shadow Clones could carry you," Naruto offered. 

"I'd rather die," said Sabuka clearly. Naruto looked both crestfallen and mildly angry, as if he were going to burst out again, but the redhead cut him off. "I'll just return to Sand Village in a bit."

"You're completely lost," pointed out Sasuke coolly. Sabuka couldn't help but feel that he had an ulterior motive.

"Well, then, someone can point me in the right direction," returned the kunoichi. 

"You," said a dark voice behind were, "will get the hell out of my desert." Kakashi and Sasuke immediately went on the defensive; Sakura looked frightened; and Naruto fell over out of shock. Slowly, Sabuka stood and turned around as Gaara went on menacingly, "And you will never come back."

Unwisely, the kunoichi almost said, "Who died and made you Kazekage?" Wisely, she didn't, and simply mumbled instead, "Yes, sir." 

Gaara disappeared as silently as he had come, just as Sasuke began to shout something that sounded like a challenge. Sabuka looked around at Squad 7, sighed, and said, "I hope you're up to walking, because I refuse to run."

--

"I don't need a hospital," Sabuka protested furiously as they tried to convince her to stay at one, "unless you now have pills for restoring chakra, and in that case, you can just give them to me." 

She glared around at her besiegers. "If someone could just lend me some money, I'll rent a room somewhere and pay you back later."

"Or you could stay with me," Sakura offered, perhaps the first useful thing she'd done since Sabuka had met her. The red-haired kunoichi professed her thanks and, when they reached the rose-haired kunoichi's home, fell asleep on the couch without asking.

--

Several days later, Sabuka was lounging on the couch, talking rather desultorily to Sakura, when Sasuke stalked in.

"Sasuke-kun is in my house!" Sakura squealed obnoxiously. Sasuke ignored her.

"You," he said coldly to Sabuka, "fought Gaara."

"Not really," the redhead denied, sitting up. "More like I was attacked and beaten by him."

"You survived," amended Sasuke coolly, "an attack by Gaara."

"Alright," agreed Sabuka cautiously.

"You will fight me," the dark-haired shinobi ordered icily, "and show me how you did it." 

"No," Sabuka said firmly, scrambling to her feet. "It nearly got Gaara killed last time. And me. I'm not ever doing it again."

"I need to get stronger," Sasuke growled. "I need to be able to kill _him_!" 

"I'm not going to help you kill Gaara," replied the redhead disgustedly, sitting back down.

"Not Gaara. Someone else," he snarled. "But I can't. Not until I can defeat Gaara." Sasuke glared at her, his eyes overflowing with hatred. But not, Sabuka thought, directed at her. Or even Gaara. 

"I'll be waiting at the training field with the three posts when you're ready," he said coolly, then left.

Sabuka lay back. "He thinks I'm the type of person that can't resist a challenge. Well, I can, when I need to."

She looked over at Sakura. She saw shock, a lot of envy, and definitely a large amount of annoyance.

In the end, she went.

--


	8. Chapter 8

She had forgotten that she hadn't a clue where anything was in Leaf Village. Apparently, so had Sasuke, or else he just liked making a fool of her.

Eventually, by asking several people, Sabuka found it. But then, the overcast sky had turned to rain.

Sabuka smiled smugly to herself, her expression rather like that of a satisfied cat. After all, lightning did better in a storm than it did in a person, and shadows were harder to see in the dark.

In the center of the field, the kunoichi saw her own expression mirrored on Sasuke's face, although he smirked - no doubt - because she had showed. Sabuka had showed, and Sasuke wanted to fight.

Sabuka idly walked around to the three posts and surreptitiously surveyed her surroundings while appearing to keep her gaze only on Sasuke. He gazed back, coolly, but with anticipation.

"You're late," the dark-haired shinobi called. She could have been wrong, but Sabuka thought she heard his voice tremble with excitement; he was anxious to get started.

"I disagree," the kunoichi retorted. "You set no specific time. It's not possible to be late." She couldn't resist adding, "I would have come later, but your rose-haired girlfriend has a glare like kunai. I think you lost me my place to stay."

Sabuka strolled towards Sasuke, hands in her pockets. Annoyance tinged the expression on his face; no doubt he didn't like the girlfriend remark.

She really had to stop irritating the people who wanted to hurt her.

"Shall we get started, then?" Sabuka asked jauntily.

Without answering, Sasuke chucked a lone kunai at her, a weak distraction from his immediate disappearance and reappearance beside her. Sabuka ducked his sideways jab and swept out with her foot. He evaded it easily by leaping backwards and flung several shuriken in her direction. The kunoichi swung her arm up, kunai in hand, and blocked them deftly, knocking the throwing stars to the ground. She then threw a few of her own, which Sasuke slid under, aiming a sweeping kick for her ankles. Sabuka backed away from it and threw a sidekick toward his head; he blocked upward in an X-block and grabbed her arm, twisting it. A palm strike went toward his face; Sasuke released her limb to block one-handed and Sabuka sank her half-freed fist into his stomach. 

_First Blow._

It was a weak blow, restrained as it was, but he let go, acknowledging the strike despite its lack of damage. They both jumped back; in the same fluid movement, Sasuke sent three kunai speeding for Sabuka. Not expecting them, she was unable to do much to evade them, though it didn't much matter. Two of them flew wide, simply thudding into the wooden posts behind her. The third sliced along her cheek and stuck in the center pole.

_First Blood._

Sabuka wiped it away with the back of her hand, although it trickled down again, and rubbed it on her pants, eying Sasuke. She began to move forward, but Sasuke had other ideas.

"Fire Style: Dragon Flame Jutsu!"

_First Ninjutsu._

Euphoric flames raced along the threads attached to the kunai - the threads that Sabuka had not noticed. She was trapped between them with nowhere to go.

"_Akakekkai!"_

The hemisphere of red rose around her; the fire met it and rebounded, unable to continue along the strings. As soon as the fire faded, so did the barrier; she did not want to waste chakra.

Sasuke began to run toward Sabuka, all his concentration locked on the kunoichi, who had began several complicated hand seals. In a split second's lapse, Sasuke slipped in the mud; Sabuka slid one hand behind the other and raised her palms to the sky.

"_Akarai Arashi Jutsu_ - Red Lightning Storm Technique!"

The clouds above went from dark grey to crimson black, like shadowy blood. Ubiquitous scarlet light flashed, and the rain turned red as it hit the ground.

Then a twisting, multi-forked bolt of lightning streaked down toward Sasuke.

He dodged it, but it grew a lateral branch that reached for him with greedy crimson tendrils. With a screech like metal scraping across glass, the lightning flexed and wrapped around the dark-haired shinobi, detaching from the sky. It contracted, crackling with scarlet electricity.

A few moments later, Sabuka released the technique, unable to maintain the flow of chakra. Before the lightning vanished, it flung Sasuke backwards into the mud.

_First Fall._

Sasuke scrambled to his feet and raced toward her. He began to throw a punch but vanished before it was completed. Appearing next to her, he finished the strike; Sabuka just barely stopped it with an inner wrist block and attempted a punch to Sasuke's solar plexus. He caught it in the palm of his hand and hook the kunoichi's legs out from under her, throwing her to the ground, but not letting go of her right hand.

As a kick came for her nose, Sabuka reflected that they should have established rules for how far this could go. 

Her left arm came up just in time; the kick glanced off it and hit her cheekbone - damage slightly reduced and no longer bone-shattering - as well as her eye, though she closed it before contact. The kunoichi twisted from Sasuke's grasp and rolled away, coating herself in mud, then scrambled to her feet.

They backed away from each other, both panting, both muddy. Sasuke's clothes were scorched from the chakra lightning; Sabuka's were no longer visible beneath the grime.

The kunoichi turned her face to the sky, letting the rain wash into her bruised eye. Sasuke took advantage of Sabuka's distraction and flung several shuriken at her. They thudded sickly into her flesh, but her body was immediately replaced by a log.

Sabuka turned up behind Sasuke, but her roundhouse kick met only another log. A kunai pierced her shoulder, but she was, once again, only a substitution.

From the relative protection of a tree's foliage, Sabuka cried, "_Kage no Shinkudoki_ - Crimson Wrath of Shadows!" At the same time, nearby, she heard an icy hiss.

"_Sharingan."_

Then the world around them went black.

--

The effects were similar to that of her Red Moon technique, but Sabuka's silhouette this time was a brilliant scarlet, her eyes an abyssal ebony. But then, instead of growing, the silhouette multiplied.

The original glided down from the tree and turned. Her wide, unnerving eyes met the deep, ebony-pierced rubies of Sasuke's Sharingan.

Gradually, scarlet silhouettes of Sasuke Uchiha added to the immense crowd.

Sabuka swore.

--

To be perfectly blunt, she was no match for Sasuke. While her techniques could have been strong, she was terrible at controlling the flow of chakra. Molding it into fancy shapes for an audience took a lot less management than manipulating it in the heat of battle. As she had already demonstrated, Sabuka often used up a lot more than she needed.

So she had counted on using this technique to take him out, a thousand to one. But now it was a thousand to a thousand, and they were not equally matched.

_You have potential,_ she remembered. _You have potential, but no control. Concentrate. Let go of the sarcasm in battle._

She had never remembered that before.

The carmine shadows were fighting each other now, locked in crimson combat. Sabuka's silhouettes were losing miserably, as she had predicted.

The kunoichi silhouette turned to fight and a scarlet fist caught her in the jaw. Whether or not it was the original Sasuke, she couldn't tell.

"So, you're a copycat," Sabuka quipped, in case it was the real Sasuke. There was no reply, but that didn't mean much.

A hint of sand swirled across her vision, but there was no sand here. _Forget the insults, Sabuka, and _concentrate.

The kunoichi shadow stumbled away from the Sasuke shadow into another. She turned around and began to spar with it. If she _could_ concentrate, she could awake the full power of the Crimson Wrath…

But she couldn't: Her chakra, even now, was almost gone. And there was no concentrating in this crowd.

A kunai thudded into her left arm, dangerously close to where her scar would be. That was one good thing about this world: In it, she couldn't bleed.

But then a second kunai pierced her right shoulder, and she was jolted back to the real world, where she could.

Sasuke stood behind the kneeling, bleeding kunoichi, a third kunai held at her throat. "Yield," he ordered icily.

"Yes," Sabuka replied, panting. She was trying not to rock forward from exhaustion, as that would have slit her throat on the blade. "I lost. Please remove that before I kill myself on it."

The dark-haired shinobi took the kunai away and the kunoichi fell forward to her hands and knees.

"That was interesting," said Sasuke coolly.

"Not really," gasped Sabuka, although it had been. _Very_ interesting. "You can leave now." She sat back on her knees. "I have to go find a place to stay. Sakura is probably not going to take me back."

Sasuke shrugged and walked away.

Sabuka watched him fade into the rain, regretting only that she had used too much chakra to leave for Sand Village right away.

--

When she reached Sunakagure, night had fallen a few hours before. Sabuka wove her way through the streets of Sand Village; on her approach of Ora's house and café, the cloaked medical ninja left without a word. Ryūken glared at her, but said nothing as Sabuka slid behind the counter and picked up her notebook.

"I can help you, ma'am," the kunoichi cheerfully informed the one woman in line.

--

"I thought you'd be back," Ora told her, although there was no trace of annoyance. Just satisfaction at being accurate.

"Well, you thought right," returned Sabuka. Then, because she thought that was a little impertinent to one who had essentially taken her in, the kunoichi bowed and added, "Thank you. For everything. You don't mind, do you?"

"Not as long as you keep working," Ora said. "Your room is in the same place."

"Eternally grateful," Sabuka assured her, and collapsed into bed a few minutes later.

--

"I'm going to need a new map," Sabuka moaned into her pillow as a bundle hit the ground behind her. The kunoichi rolled sideways and landed on top of it.

"I'm a bit ahead of you," came Ora's reply, which sounded far too awake for this time of morning. "There is one in the package. But don't worry about it now. You were traveling all day yesterday. Sleep a little later this morning."

So Sabuka rolled off the bundle and tumbled back into slumber.

--

Someone prodded her forcefully in the back and Sabuka grumbled at Tianmaru to leave her alone. Then she realized that she had simply shifted back on top of Ora's package and she had absolutely no idea who Tianmaru was.

Sabuka made a disgusted sound and sat up. There were some clothes in the dresser, she discovered, and she put them on. The white shirt had elbow-length sleeves that weren't quite long enough, and the kunoichi was forced to tear a strip off the bottom of the stormy grey trousers, giving them an oddly lopsided look.

On the way out, Sabuka stopped by the café, where an irritable young man – not Ryūken – informed her that "Ms. Kaido said you eat for free". Impressed – with Ora's generosity – Sabuka ordered something she could eat as she walked, and headed out into the heat without forgetting a canteen of water.

--


	9. Chapter 9

Note: This is the second-to-last chapter. Hooray! Your pain is almost at an end! For those who've read this far, domo arigato gozaimasu! **-worship-**

**---**

Errands done, Sabuka peered closely at the map. Locating her destination, the kunoichi stopped by the well to fill up her canteen, then continued on.

To the Ninja Academy.

The extensive building looked vaguely familiar, but then, there was one in every village. However, the structures did vary from place to place…

She was probably just grasping at straws.

Sabuka pushed open a door and stepped in. A bored-looking shinobi who obviously had not volunteered for this job was leaning on a desk, head on his hand. (Idly, Sabuka wondered if welcoming was labeled as a 'mission'.) He appeared rather hopeless, as if his shift still had a long way to go.

"You're too old to become a ninja," he said dispassionately as the kunoichi came closer.

"What is it with you people?" Sabuka demanded. "Why do you all think I want to just now start shinobi training? Is it inconceivable that I have any other reason for being here?"

"Yes. Now go away."

"Aren't you supposed to be welcoming?"

"Look, I didn't volunteer for this, and – "

"I figured. Can you just tell me where I can find a record of all shinobi?"

"Why?" he asked suspiciously.

"Because I want to look someone up. Is that such a hard concept to grasp?"

"Who?"

"What difference does it make?"

"Look," the shinobi said irritably, "I have no proof that you're not an enemy shinobi trying to gather – "

"Do you people _really_ have that big of a problem with me _coincidentally_ looking like Gaara?" Sabuka demanded.

"Look – "

"His name is Tianmaru," the kunoichi interrupted with an exasperated sigh. "I want to find out – "

"He died."

"What?"

"Tianmaru died a year ago," the shinobi repeated.

"Wh – How?"

"Mission," he said evasively.

"Can you be more specific?" Sabuka inquired.

"No."

"Do you have a picture on hand?"

"Why would I carry around a picture of a random dead shinobi?"

"Then can I see the records?" the kunoichi concluded exasperatedly.

"No!"

"Obviously," said Sabuka, "you've never fully comprehended the little thing called logic." Exchanging irritated glares with the shinobi, Sabuka left.

She would come back later, when someone else was there. Or perhaps she could simply go in another way.

Sabuka stopped dead in the street, then turned to survey the building. She had no idea where any sort of records room would be, but once inside, people might assume she belong there and direct her along. Or they might not…

Maybe she should simply go to the Kazekage and ask him for records. Surely he had a copy: How could the village leader not?

No, she couldn't go to him. He would not fear her for resembling Gaara, she thought, but he would hate her. And even if he wouldn't, she couldn't bring herself to ask for help from the one who could hurt a child so deeply.

She would just think of finding the records as a mission, something she hadn't had in so long.

…_an important mission, worth more than your lives…_

Not worth that much, it was only to satisfy her curiosity, but… wait, what? Where had _that_ come from?

…_blood spattering everywhere, spreading throughout the sand… screaming… and bodies, bodies everywhere…_

Sabuka's head reeled and the kunoichi stumbled over to a wall, leaning her head on her arm, which she rested against the stone. Her breath came in short, pained gasps; she closed her eyes and tried to slow it down.

…_you made your choice…_

Sabuka sank into a crouch, holding her hands to her head. Her fingers tangled in her hair, creating a cloud of wispy red.

…_blood for blood…_

"You know how it feels now."

The kunoichi, startled, tried to stand. She almost crashed into the wall, but managed to turn and face the speaker, whose words were colder than the desert night.

"Gaara," she gasped out, "I – "

" – was told not to come back." Sand began to twist around him in a lethal waltz. "Or else I would kill you."

"Yes, but – "

"I gave you fair warning," he hissed. "You can call nothing from your foolish rule of lives for lives…"

Sabuka's vision blacked out. _…life for life, and blood for blood.._

Tears began to trail down her face, but they were as brilliant and crimson as blood itself. Gaara's image swam in her vision, a hazy sort of red, like everything in her sight.

"I remember," she whispered, and then she screamed.

--

But remembrance did not protect her from Gaara.

The sand did not stop because she cried tears of blood.

And Death did not wait for the past.

Sabuka watched it come, everything in sight still tinted red, and the snaking sand looked more like snaking blood. She stared at it, and then her seafoam eyes hardened desperately.

"_Akagan_," she whispered. "_Ketsu no Ko – _Red Eyes: Child of Blood."

--

She didn't know what it was going to do, and she wasn't about to find out. It was as if she had suddenly gone blind: Her sight was still veiled by scarlet, but it had darkened, and now it was opaque, solid, unchanging.

Sabuka panicked.

"Gaara!" she shouted. Though she could see nothing, she could hear it. It was a swishing, splashing, eerie sort of noise, like… like water, like…

Blood.

_What have I done?_

"No! Gaara!" This time, it was not her mother who attacked, and the kunoichi could no plead as a daughter pleaded with a parent.

It was not the mother… it was the child. The Child of Blood.

Crying, Sabuka stumbled blindly forward, her hand outstretched. Her bare feet splashed into an icy, vile liquid; the kunoichi squeezed her eyes shut, and a tiny, disgusted sound escaped her.

But when she reopened her eyes, she still could not see.

Sabuka crashed to her knees; the chilling fluid splashed up over her body, burning her skin, her face, her arms.

The kunoichi's hand clapped over her scar. She heard only the rippling of the blood around her; perhaps Gaara had made it away, far, far away…

Then he cried out in pain.

In that cry, Sabuka heard seven years stripped away, seven years of pain that had made him what he was today. What remained beneath those torn wrappings was a broken infant, a betrayed six-year-old, a child who had never felt physical pain or seen his own blood.

The child's anguish, so long hidden behind the inhuman mask, drew Sabuka back to her feet and carried her forward through the chilling blood. She tripped on the uneven cobblestones, stumbled in the shifting liquid, but did not fall again.

Gaara was silent now, though the chakra-infused blood was not, and Sabuka no longer knew if she was traveling the right way.

But then her questing fingers met a hard, grainy surface: Sand. Sand, trying to stop the threat.

"Gaara," Sabuka said, and then again, "Gaara." She pressed against the sandy wall with the palms of her hands, wondering whether he lay bleeding on the other side.

"There is," she began, then stopped, started over.

"Love," Sabuka said, and paused, then went on, "may be on your forehead. But hate is in your heart. You don't…" She stumbled, hesitated, continued. "You don't love yourself. You don't understand love at all." The kunoichi rested her head on the gritty barricade and closed her still-useless eyes.

"Neither do I. I don't get it at all. But I…" She choked, stopped, finished. "I love you anyway."

--

The sand thrust her away.

He was alive in there, at least. Alive _enough_ that he continued to be shielded.

Sabuka was tossed back into the blood. It shifted around her, telling her that Gaara would not be protected for long.

The kunoichi grabbed for a kunai, but the pouch had been lost. So had her shuriken holster. Sabuka scrabbled through the fluctuating fluid, searching for something sharp, but her hands met only sandy stone and seeping blood.

At long last, her fingers closed around the hilt of a kunai. Sabuka breathed a sigh of relief and rose unsteadily to her feet. Though she couldn't see it, she knew exactly where the scar was.

--

Pinpoints of light, like stars, seared across her scarlet vision as the blade bit deep. Sabuka cried out before she could stop herself, then gritted her teeth and dug deeper. The blood that flowed forth glowed with chakra, and the fluorescent crimson fell to mingle with the carmine carpet.

She could see again, but everything was thrown into harsh detail, giving her a fierce headache to add to her other pain. Edges were too sharp, colors too bright, shadows too dark.

But she could _see_.

Without warning, all the blood around her exploded into the air, a storm of scarlet. The amalgam of Sabuka, her mother, and Gaara whipped into a frenzy, writhing, twisting, dancing, _hurting_…

Sabuka screamed, but the wordless cry formed itself into one, distinctive name.

"_Gaara!"_

As if he would help her. As if he would even dream of thinking about considering saving her. As if there was a chance.

But there wasn't, and she knew it, and she was right.

_You made your choice…_

"Tianmaru," the kunoichi whispered, her head bowed in uncharacteristic humility. "Forgive me."

--

She awoke beneath stone and lay staring at the ceiling for an eternity. Her whole body throbbed in time with her heartbeat, and each breath sent shockwaves of anguish throughout her bones.

Ora came in. Sabuka didn't turn her head to look, but kept her gaze trained on the ceiling.

"Medic…?" the kunoichi croaked.

"Been and gone. There's nothing more she can do."

Sabuka sighed. Ora dropped into a crouch beside her. "You going to tell me what happened?"

"No."

"Ryūken found you in a pool of blood. I have a feeling he would have rather left you there."

"Probably."

"But he didn't. Tianmaru was his brother, you know."

Sabuka sat straight up and couldn't contain a whimper of pain. Around gritted teeth, she managed to ask, "What?"

"The people here, they're prejudiced, but not that much. The children who don't remember, maybe it's their reason, but not those who are older. They fear Gaara, and they might hate you for looking so similar, but it's not why they're scared."

"Everyone _knew_? This whole time?"

"Maybe not the details. But yes."

Sabuka slumped back down on the pallet. Ora left.

--


	10. Chapter 10

'Tis the very, very end! Are you glad? If you've read all the way to here, I shall bow down and worship at your feet for suffering through it! -bows repeatedly- DOMO ARIGATO GOZAIMASU!

--

"_There's too much that we don't know."_

_  
"They're only Genin."_

"_That's why they'll never be suspected."_

"_They're not even our most talented Genin!"_

"_They'll have to deal with not being the best for the rest of their lives."_

"_They're _rookies_!"_

"_They need experience."_

"_Don't we get a say in this?" Tianmaru finally broke in. "Any choice at all?"_

"_I'm not sure," said Sabuka in a bored voice, "that I particularly want to. Seems like Sensei's trying to send us in with such a wonderful vote of confidence, doesn't it?"_

"_That's exactly why," said Mitsumaru – the quiet one – softly, "I think we should. Even though he says we'll never be the best, he's still trying to send us in. He thinks we can handle it."_

"_Little Sabuka, ever the pessimist," smirked Tianmaru._

_  
"Little Tianmaru, ever the pest," riposted Sabuka, rolling her eyes._

Sabuka jolted awake._ I don't want to remember this again._

For several minutes more, she stared at the ceiling. Then she stood up unsteadily and left.

--

Just but looking at its remains, Sabuka knew that Ora had understated the size. The blood hadn't been a puddle so much as a lake: It covered the entire area, splattering against the nearby buildings, coating them, hiding their original hue.

Idly, Sabuka wondered if the stains would ever fade.

" '_They'll never be suspected', eh?" Sabuka said sarcastically. "Because we're Genin, I thought."_

_Enemy shinobi surrounded them in an angry circle obviously upset at the infiltration of their home. They weren't saying anything, but they were preparing for battle; there was no mercy, not even for the young._

"_Sabuka," said Mitsumaru calmly, "shut up._

"_Make me," she retorted, fear reducing her words to childishness._

"_Concentrate," ordered their sensei, an older man with long silver hair, his hitai-ate hanging from an ebony sash._

"_Sensei – " began Tianmaru, but then the other shinobi moved at a blinding speed._

"Akakekkai!" _Sabuka cried instinctively, but she wasn't quick enough to save the other three._

_  
The kunoichi's hands bristled with shuriken, but the enemies held her team in place with chakra and kunai placed at their throats._

"_Surrender," snarled one shinobi, "or they die."_

"_You'll kill them anyway," returned Sabuka, trying to sound bored, trying not to sound terrified. She did not _want_ to be tortured for what she knew. But how could she abandon her team?_

_The kunai pressed against Mitsumaru's skin, drawing blood. Sabuka inhaled sharply, then let a few shuriken fall to the ground._

Concentrate.

_Breathing deeply, the kunoichi began to release the flow of chakra as slowly as possible, so it appeared as if the barrier were fading. But she never had been good at manipulation when it was important, and in the end, she shield simply vanished, shattering her plans._

_Shinobi were on her in a flash. Sabuka stiffened, fear clouding her vision._

_In front of her, the man holding Mitsumaru grinned maliciously. "You made your choice," he hissed gleefully, and the blade bit greedily into Mitsumaru's throat._

_Sabuka and Tianmaru cried out; their sensei closed his eyes and turned his head away. The enemy ninja released the boy's body and let it fall to the ground, a broken doll._

"_Mitsumaru!" Sabuka screamed, but she still had one shuriken left in her hand._

_The kunoichi swung the steely star in an arc that ended with its point buried in her scar. An invisible hand forced the shinobi off her, and then blood burst from her arm._

Sabuka lurched to her feet, almost falling. She needed to get _out_ of this place, and do it soon. She was going to go insane.

That was when she saw the trail of bloody footsteps leading into the shadows of an alley.

--

Sabuka followed them, certain she knew whose they were. She kept one hand always on the wall for support.

Dread and anticipation lingered in her heart, feeling like someone had clenched and hand around it and was squeezing. It made it rather difficult to breathe, the anxiety; would it be a body or a living boy – one who would be _very _angry – at the trail's end?

The trail ended. Sabuka stopped, then called hesitantly, "Gaara?"

_She staggered into the village, alone. Mitsumaru, dead. The enemy shinobi, dead. Tianmaru, Sensei, dead._

_Willing hands caught her, their owners unaware, only worried. They cared for her, those days were just a blur._

_And the minute she could walk, she went back._

_Because she had not been coherent enough to tell their exact location, the bodies had not been moved. They lay where they had fallen. Carrion birds feasted on their flesh; Sabuka chased them away._

_The enemy shinobi, Tianmaru, Sensei. Dead by her own hand._

_Dazed, the kunoichi reached out. The blood that had seeped into and stained the dusty ground began to wriggled and leach out of it. Crimson rose to her fingers, then coated her arm and began to diffuse through her skin._

"Damn it, I want you to leave me _alone_," Sabuka growled, scrubbing at her eyes with one arm.

"Then why did you follow me?" demanded a cold voice.

--

Gaara was suddenly before her, and though she hadn't sensed him before, Sabuka guessed he had been on the roof, watching her. The kunoichi peered up into his hard stare, then dropped her eyes.

"Please," she said wearily, not bothering to correct his misconception that she wanted _him_ to go away. "I'm sorry for what happened." Although she could see no wound, no evidence of the attack, Sabuka knew it was there. He was hiding it from her, and she wished she knew how bad it was.

"I'm sorry for what _I_ did," she went on. "I had no control. But as much as I maybe deserve to die, I'm not particularly in the mood for it today."

Oddly enough, no sand waltzed around her. Puzzled, Sabuka slowly raised her gaze to meet Gaara's. He said nothing, only looking coldly back at her.

_Inside Suna's confines, worried hands once more reached out for her. But this time, whispers of questions punctuated the concern._

_It only took three words. Three _names_. They set her off._

"…_Mitsumaru..."_

"…_Tianmaru…"_

"…_Furuganshi-Sensei..."_

_She cried out as her blood boiled. Though she wrapped her arms around herself, she couldn't stop it. Many around her died instantly. The others drew back, first in surprise, then fear, then panic. A clearing formed around her as people fled her despair._

_But one person remained in her path. He was a year younger than her, not even technically qualified as a shinobi yet, but far stronger than she. The sand did not flinched beneath the blood, but instead hungrily soaked it up._

_  
And through it all, he continued standing there impassively, coldly looking on._

Now on her knees, Sabuka gazed up at Gaara through her bangs. "I remember," she whispered. "Do you?"

But he only turned and walked away.

--

The kunoichi staggered back to Ora's house, exhaustion weighing her limbs down. She skirted around the remains of the scarlet storm, trying to avert her gaze, but the blood was all-encompassing, and her eyes inevitably slid to it as she walked through.

"_She doesn't remember what she did."_

"…_has to be locked away."_

"…_not a demon. You can't just seal it up."_

"…_have to bind it somehow."_

"…_doesn't remember…"_

"…_danger… too dangerous…"_

"…_can't stay here."_

"…_Gaara…able to stop her."_

"…_demon, too. A monster, unpredictable, uncontrollable…"_

_  
"…look so alike…"_

"…_can't trust either of them…"_

_They didn't know that she could hear them, a hundred voices clamoring to be heeded. Sabuka sat, huddled against a wall, and wondered what it was she had done. Though she asked, she met only stares, forced blank and uncomprehending. But she wasn't stupid. She could see that the ignorance was a mask._

_The room was opening, the council crowding out. Sabuka didn't bother to veil her presence at all, and they enclosed her in a half-circle that trapped her against the wall._

"_Kazekage-sama," said Sabuka wearily, "where are Tianmaru, Mitsumaru, and Sensei?"_

"_On a mission," he said, not particularly kindly. It was the same evasive answer she'd been given a thousand times at least._

"_And why," the kunoichi went on, "aren't I with them?"_

"_Because you weren't feeling well," he said shortly._

"_Then why didn't another team go?"_

_A council elder knelt down beside her, probably the only one to not fear her. Sabuka thought he was the one who had defended her in the meeting._

"_Because they were needed for this one. Please, come, child. We'll make you well so that next time you can go."_

"_I'm not a kid anymore," Sabuka mumbled. "I'm a shinobi." But she stood up to follow him anyway._

Sabuka ground her teeth in frustration to cover her despair and walked through the stained sand and stone with her eyes closed.

--

_The circle was about six feet in diameter and made up of alternating shuriken and kunai stuck point first into the ground. At each of the four directions, a lit candle of pale gold stood, flames flickering mildly._

_Sabuka sat in the center, head bowed. "Will this really make me better?" she asked dully. She didn't even feel sick at all, besides her lack of memory of the past week or so._

"_Assuredly," responded the Kazekage coolly._

"_I don't even know what's supposedly wrong with me."_

"_Please hand over your headband."_

_Reluctantly, Sabuka undid the knot and pulled it from her forehead. She held it out, and one of the council members reached across the circle to take it._

"_One drop of blood," ordered the Kazekage, "on each candle."_

Sabuka's eyes drifted open, waking her from the end of the dream. After that, she had awoken on the border of Rain Village without a clue. She remembered being a shinobi, recalled how it worked, and her mother's betrayal was still burned into her mind's eye. But that was all.

For two years, she hadn't had a clue.

--

Ever so idly, Sabuka wondered what would happen now. The story was over, the sequence of memories at an end. Would they start over? Would her next dream be the beginning again, the argument of whether they should go?

She couldn't stand that, over and over again. Each time, she would try to tell herself, her team, what should be done. She would try to do it again every single time, and never would she be able to change it. She would go insane, _more_ insane.

She was afraid to close her eyes, afraid to go back to sleep again. Even though the memories had already shown to her that they could come any time, anywhere, she didn't want to dream. She was terrified, frightened that they would start going into more and more detail, showing her each and every event in the sharpest images. She would be able to see every fact of that time, the tiniest aspect that could have changed the outcome. A slightly faster release of the chakra to form a barrier. A marginally quicker throw of a shuriken. A more controlled manipulation. A word that might have given them away.

And even smaller things, Sabuka knew, would make her wonder, even things that would have no bearing whatsoever. The shirt she wore that day. The placement of shuriken in the holster. The tangles in her hair. They didn't matter in the sequence of events, but her every thought would be a _what if_. And she couldn't take that.

She couldn't sleep another moment in this place, for fear of dreams, for fear of _what if_s. For fear of memory.

It all centered around Suna, the kunoichi knew. It had all happened because of this place, this Village Hidden in the Sand. None of the villages were really hidden. It wouldn't be so easy to find them. So easy to infiltrate. They wouldn't try. They wouldn't send rookies. It never would have happened.

Her thoughts were going in circles, endless repeating circles. This would be how it was for all eternity. Until her death – perhaps beyond, if there was such an existence beyond death. She would always remember, always remember, always cry.

She had to get out of Suna.

--

"Thanks for outfittin' me with this stuff, Ora."

"Are you sure you want to leave?" inquired Ora mildly, raising one eyebrow at Sabuka. "You're no less welcome because you've remembered."

The kunoichi cocked and eyebrow in return and glanced around as if she were looking for something.

"I seem to be missing the 'welcome' part, 'cause the only friendly face I see is you."

"That's no less than at the beginning," Ora put in mildly.

"The medic…?"

"Left."

Damn. She had taken a lot of answers with her, Sabuka thought. Oh well, that was life.

"Doesn't matter. Gaara wouldn't be particularly happy with me if I stayed anyway."

Ora looked skeptical. "And is making Gaara happy your goal in life now?"

"Nope," said Sabuka brightly. "But staying alive definitely is. Besides, I've already been kicked out of this village once."

The kunoichi paused, sobering slightly, then grinned again. "I guess I'm sort of missing the feeling, you know what I mean?"

"No."

Sabuka ignored her and went on, "Give me a few more years to get myself thrown out of another one, and I just might be back."

"Don't cause too much trouble."

The kunoichi waved as she turned away. "Why not?"

Grinning, hiding her prayers that the memories would remain here, Sabuka shouldered her canteen and left both the past and the future behind.

--

THE END!


End file.
